YOU 

NEVER  KNOW 
YOUR  LUCK 

GILBERT  PARKER 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW 
YOUR  LUCK 


GILBERT  PARKER 


IHIIT.  OF  CALIF.  L1HKAKY.  LOS  ANGELES 


A  SOB  ALMOST  BROKE  FROM  HER  AS  SHE  GAZED  HER  FILL. 


Being  the  Story  of  a  Matrimonial  Deserter 


By  GILBERT  PARKER 

Author  of  "The  Seats  of  the  Mighty,"  "The 
Weavers,"  "  The  Judgment  House,"  Etc. 


With  Four  Illustrations  in  Colon 
By  W.  L.  JACOBS 


A.  L  BURT  COMPANY,  PUBLISHERS 

114-120  East  Twenty-third  Street       -       -       New  York 

PUBLISHED  BY  ARRANGEMENT  WITH  GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


Copyright,  1914, 
BY  GILBERT  PARKER 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

PROEM n 

CHAPTER 

I     "PIONEERS,   O   PIONEERS" 15 

II     CLOSING  THE  DOORS 33 

III  THE    LOGAN    TRIAL   AND   WHAT   CAME 

OF  IT 54 

IV  "  STRENGTH  SHALL  BE  GIVEN  THEE  "    .     79 
V    A  STORY  TO  BE  TOLD 87 

VI  "  HERE  ENDETH  THE  FIRST  LESSON  "      .     98 

VII  A  WOMAN'S  WAY  TO  KNOWLEDGE     .      .125 

VIII  ALL  ABOUT  AN  UNOPENED  LETTER   .      .   147 

IX  NIGHT  SHADE  AND  MORNING  GLORY      .    162 

X  "S.   O.   S." 175 

XI  IN  THE  CAMP  OF  THE  DESERTER  .      .      .181 

XII  AT  THE  RECEIPT  OF  CUSTOMS  ....   197 

XIII  KITTY  SPEAKS  HER  MIND  AGAIN.      .      .211 

XIV  AWAITING  THE  VERDICT 229 


CONTENTS 
CHAPTER  PAGE 

XV    "  MALE     AND     FEMALE     CREATED     HE 

THEM  " 250 

XVI  MIDNIGHT  Is  NOT  FAR  OFF  ....  266 
XVII  WHO  WOULD  HAVE  THOUGHT  IT?  .  .  279 
EPILOGUE 322 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

A  sob  almost  broke  from  her  as  she  gazed  her 

fill Frontispiece 

PAGE 
"Where  away  goes  my  lad?     Tell  me,  has  he  gone 

alone?" 22 

It  was  strangely  magnetic,  this  tale  of  a  man's  life  .     98 
"You — you  here!" 254 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 


PROEM 


DID  you  ever  see  it  in  reaping  time?  A  sea 
of  gold  it  is,  with  gentle  billows  telling  of 
sleep  and  not  of  storm,  which,  like  regiments 
afoot,  salute  the  reaper  and  say,  "All  is  fulfilled 
in  the  light  of  the  sun  and  the  way  of  the  earth; 
let  the  sharp  knife  fall."  The  countless  million 
heads  are  heavy  with  fruition,  and  sun  glorifies 
and  breeze  cradles  them  to  the  hour  of  harvest. 
The  air — like  the  tingle  of  water  from  a  moun- 
tain-spring in  the  throat  of  the  worn  wayfarer, 
bringing  a  sense  of  the  dust  of  the  world  flushed 
away. 

Arcady?  Look  closely.  Here  and  there,  like 
islands  in  the  shining  yellow  sea,  are  houses — 
sometimes  in  a  clump  of  trees,  sometimes  only  like 
bare-backed  domesticity  or  naked  industry  in  the 
workfield.  Also  rising  here  and  there  in  the  ex- 
panse, clouds  that  wind  skyward,  spreading  out 
in  a  powdery  mist.  They  look  like  the  rolling 
[11] 


PROEM 

smoke  of  incense,  of  sacrifice.  Sacrifice  it  is. 
The  vast  steam  thrashers  are  mightily  devouring 
what  their  servants,  the  monster  steam-reapers, 
have  gleaned  for  them.  Soon,  when  September 
comes,  all  that  waving  sea  will  be  still.  What 
was  gold  will  still  be  a  rusted  gold,  but  near  to 
the  earth — the  stubble  of  the  corn  now  lying  in 
vast  garners  by  the  railway  lines,  awaiting  trans- 
port east  and  west  and  south  and  across  the  seas. 
Not  Arcady  this,  but  a  land  of  industry  in  the 
grip  of  industrialists,  whose  determination  to 
achieve  riches  is,  in  spite  of  themselves,  chastened 
by  the  magnitude  and  orderly  process  of  nature's 
travail  which  is  not  pain.  Nature  hides  her  in- 
ternal striving  under  a  smother  of  white  for  many 
months  in  every  year,  when  what  is  now  gold  in 
the  sun  will  be  a  soft — sometimes,  too,  a  hard 
— shining  coverlet  like  impacted  wool.  Then, 
instead  of  the  majestic  clouds  of  incense  from  the 
thrashers,  will  rise  blue  spiral  wreaths  of  smoke 
from  the  lonely  home.  Here  the  farmer  rests  till 
spring,  comforting  himself  in  the  thought  that 
while  he  waits,  far  under  the  snow  the  wheat  is 
slowly  expanding;  and  as  in  April,  the  white 
frost  flies  out  of  the  soil  into  the  sun,  it  will  push 
upward  and  outward,  green  and  vigorous,  greet- 

[12] 


PROEM 

ing  his  eye  with  the  "What  cheer,  partner!"  of 
a  mate  in  the  scheme  of  nature. 

Not  Arcady;  and  yet  many  of  the  joys  of  Ar- 
cady  are  here — bright,  singing  birds,  wide  adven- 
turous rivers,  innumerable  streams,  the  squirrel 
in  the  wood  and  the  bracken,  the  wildcat  stealing 
through  the  undergrowth,  the  lizard  glittering  by 
the  stone,  the  fish  leaping  in  the  stream,  the  plaint 
of  the  whippoorwill,  the  call  of  the  bluebird,  the 
golden  flash  of  the  oriole,  the  honk  of  the  wild 
geese  overhead,  the  whirr  of  the  mallard  from 
the  sedge.  And,  more  than  all,  a  human  voice 
declaring  by  its  joy  in  song  that  not  only  God 
looks  upon  the  world  and  finds  it  very  good. 


[13] 


CHAPTER  I 
"PIONEERS,    O    PIONEERS" 

IF  you  had  stood  on  the  borders  of  Askatoon, 
a  prairie  town,  on  the  pathway  to  the  Rockies 
one  late  August  day  not  many  years  ago,  you 
would  have  heard  a  fresh  young  human  voice 
singing  into  the  morning,  as  its  possessor  looked 
from  a  coat  she  was  brushing  out  over  the  "field 
of  the  cloth  of  gold,"  which  your  eye  has  already 
been  invited  to  see.  With  the  gift  of  singing 
for  joy  at  all,  you  should  be  able  to  sing  joyously 
at  twenty-one.  This  morning  singer  was  just 
that  age ;  and  if  you  had  looked  at  the  golden  car- 
pet of  wheat  stretching  for  scores  of  miles,  before 
you  looked  at  her,  you  would  have  thought  her 
curiously  in  tone  with  the  scene.  She  was  a 
symphony  in  gold — nothing  less.  Her  hair,  her 
cheeks,  her  eyes,  her  skin,  her  laugh,  her  voice — 
they  were  all  gold.  Everything  about  her  was 

[15] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

so  demonstratively  golden  that  you  might  have 
had  a  suspicion  it  was  made  and  not  born;  as 
though  it  was  unreal,  and  the  girl  herself  a  proper 
subject  of  suspicion.  The  eyelashes  were  so  long 
and  so  black,  the  eyes  were  so  much  like  a  topaz, 
and  the  little  glint  of  gold  in  a  tooth, — the  one 
weak  member  of  an  otherwise  perfect  array — 
that  an  air  of  faint  artificiality  surrounded  what 
was  in  every  other  way  a  remarkable  effort  of 
nature  to  give  this  region,  where  she  was  so  very 
busy,  a  keynote. 

Poseurs  have  said  that  nature  is  garish  or  ex- 
aggerated in  this  or  that;  but  it  is  a  libel.  She 
is  aristocratic  to  the  nth  degree,  and  is  never  over- 
done; she  has  courage  but  no  ostentation.  There 
was,  however,  just  a  slight  touch  of  overemphasis 
in  this  singing-girl's  presentation — that  you  were 
bound  to  say,  if  you  considered  her  quite  apart 
from  her  place  in  this  nature-scheme.  She  was 
not  wholly  aristocratic;  she  was  lacking  in  that 
high,  social  refinement  which  would  have  made 
her  gold  not  so  golden,  the  black  eyelashes  not 
so  black.  Being  unaristocratic  is  not  always  a 
matter  of  birth,  though  it  may  be  a  matter  of  par- 
entage. 

Her    parentage    was    honest    and    respectable 

[16] 


'PIONEERS,    o 


though  not  exalted.  Her  father  had  been 
an  engineer,  who  had  lost  his  life  on  a  new 
railway  of  the  West.  His  widow  had  received 
a  pension  from  the  company  insufficient  to  main- 
tain her,  and  so  she  kept  three  boarders,  the  coat 
of  one  of  whom  her  daughter  was  now  brushing 
as  she  sang.  The  widow  herself  was  the  origin 
of  the  girl's  slight  disqualification  for  being  of 
that  higher  circle  of  selection  which  nature  ar- 
ranges long  before  society  makes  its  judicial  de- 
cision. The  father  had  been  a  man  of  intelli- 
gence, which  his  daughter  to  a  real  degree  inher- 
ited; but  the  mother,  as  kind  a  soul  as  ever  lived, 
was  a  product  of  southern  English  rural  life — a 
little  sumptuous,  but  wholesome,  and  for  her 
daughter's  sake  at  least,  keeping  herself  well  and 
safely  within  the  moral  pale  in  the  midst  of 
marked  temptations.  She  was  forty-five,  and  it 
says  a  good  deal  for  her  ample  but  proper  graces 
that  at  forty-five  she  had  numerous  admirers. 
The  girl  was  English  in  appearance,  with  a  touch 
perhaps  of  Spanish — why,  who  can  say1?  Was  it 
because  of  those  Spanish  hidalgos  wrecked  on  the 
Irish  coast  long  since?  Her  mind  and  her 
tongue,  however,  were  Irish  like  her  father's. 
You  would  have  liked  her, — everybody  did — • 
[17] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

yet  you  would  have  thought  that  nature  had  over- 
done herself  for  once,  she  was  so  pointedly  de- 
signed to  express  the  ancient  dame's  colour- 
scheme,  even  to  the  delicate  auriferous  down  on 
her  youthful  cheek  and  the  purse-proud  look  of 
her  faintly  retrousse  nose;  though  in  fact  she 
never  had  had  a  purse  and  scarcely  needed  one. 
In  any  case  she  had  an  ample  pocket  in  her  dress. 

This  fairly  full  description  of  her  is  given  not 
because  she  is  the  most  important  person  in  the 
story,  but  because  the  end  of  the  story  would 
have  been  entirely  different  had  it  not  been  for 
her;  and  because  she  herself  was  one  of  those  who 
are  so  much  the  sport  of  circumstances  or  chance 
that  they  express  the  full  meaning  of  the  title  of 
this  story.  As  a  line  beneath  the  title  explains, 
the  tale  concerns  a  matrimonial  deserter.  Cer- 
tainly this  girl  had  never  deserted  matrimony, 
though  she  had  on  more  than  one  occasion  avoided 
it;  and  there  had  been  men  mean  and  low 
enough  to  imagine  they  might  allure  her  to  the 
conditions  of  matrimony  without  its  status. 

As  with  her  mother  the  advertisement  of  her 

appearance  was  wholly  misleading.     A  man  had 

once  said  to  her  that  "she  looked  too  gay  to  be 

good,"  but  in  all  essentials  she  was  as  good  as 

[18] 


'PIONEERS,    o    PIONEERS' 

she  was  gay,  and  indeed  rather  better.  Her 
mother  had  not  kept  boarders  for  seven  years 
without  getting  some  useful  knowledge  of  the 
world,  or  without  imparting  useful  knowledge; 
and  there  were  men  who,  having  paid  their  bills 
on  demand,  turned  from  her  wiser  if  not  bet- 
ter men.  Because  they  had  pursued  the  old  but 
inglorious  profession  of  hunting  tame  things, 
Mrs.  Tyndall  Tynan  had  exacted  compensation 
in  one  way  or  another — by  extras,  by  occasional 
and  deliberate  omission  of  table  luxuries,  and  by 
making  them  pay  for  their  own  mending,  which 
she  herself  only  did  when  her  boarders  behavtd 
themselves  well.  She  scored  in  any  contest — in 
spite  of  her  rather  small  brain,  large  heart,  and 
ardent  appearance.  A  very  clever,  shiftless  Irish 
husband  had  made  her  develop  shrewdness,  and 
she  was  so  busy  watching  and  fending  her  daugh- 
ter that  she  did  not  need  to  watch  and  fend  her- 
self to  the  same  extent  as  she  would  have  done 
had  she  been  free  and  childless  and  thirty.  The 
widow  Tynan  was  practical,  and  she  saw  none 
of  those  things  which  made  her  daughter  stand 
for  minutes  at  a  time  and  look  into  the  distance 
over  the  prairie  towards  the  sunset  light  or  the 
grey-blue  foothills.  She  never  sang — she  had 

[19] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

never  sung  a  note  in  her  life;  but  this  girl  of 
hers,  with  a  man's  coat  in  her  hand,  and  eyes  on 
the  joyous  scene  before  her,  was  forever  hum- 
ming or  singing.  She  had  even  sung  in  the 
church  choir  till  she  declined  to  do  so  any  longer, 
because  strangers  stared  at  her  so;  which  goes 
to  show  that  she  was  not  so  vain  as  people  of 
her  colouring  sometimes  are.  It  was  just  as  bad, 
however,  when  she  sat  in  the  congregation;  for 
then,  too,  if  she  sang,  people  stared  at  her.  So 
it  was  that  she  seldom  went  to  church  at  all;  but 
it  was  not  because  of  this  that  her  ideas  of  right 
and  wrong  were  quite  individual  and  not  con- 
ventional, as  the  tale  of  the  matrimonial  deserter 
will  show. 

This  was  not  church,  however,  and  briskly  ap- 
plying a  light  whisk-broom  to  the  coat,  she  sang 
one  of  the  songs  her  father  taught  her  when  he 
was  in  his  buoyant  or  in  his  sentimental  moods, 
and  that  was  a  good  portion  of  the  time.  It  used 
to  perplex  her — the  thrilling  buoyancy  and  the 
creepy  melancholy  which  alternately  held  her 
father;  but  as  a  child  she  had  become  so  inured 
to  it  that  she  was  not  surprised  at  the  alternate 
pensive  gaiety  and  the  blazing  exhilaration  of 
the  particular  man  whose  coat  she  now  dusted 

[20] 


'PIONEERS,    o    PIONEERS' 

long  after  there  remained  a  speck  of  dust  upon 
it.     This  was  the  song  she  sang: 

"Whereaway,  whereaway   goes   the   lad  that  once  was 

mine; 

Hereaway  I  waited  him,  hereaway  and  oft; 
When  I  sang  my  song  to  him,  bright  his  eyes  began  to 

shine — 
Hereaway  I  loved  him  well,  for  my  heart  was  soft. 

"Hereaway  my  heart  was  soft;  when  he  kissed  my  happy 

eyes, 
Held  my  hand,  and  pressed  his  cheek  warm  against  nay 

brow, 
Home  I  saw  upon  the  earth,  heaven  stood  there  in  the 

skies — 
'Whereaway,  whereaway  goes  my  lover  now !'  " 

"Whereaway  goes  my  lad — tell  me,  has  he  gone  alone? 

Never  harsh  word  did  I  speak,  never  hurt  I  gave; 
Strong  he  was  and  beautiful;  like  a  heron  he  has  flown — 

Hereaway,  hereaway  will  I  make  my  grave. 

"When  once  more  the  lad  I  loved  hereaway,  hereaway, 
Comes  to  lay  his  hand  in  mine,  kiss  me  on  the  brow, 

I  will  whisper  down  the  wind,  he  will  weep  to  hear  me 

say — 
Whereaway,  whereaway  goes  my  lover  now !" 

[21] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

There  was  a  plaintive  quality  in  the  voice  of 
this  golden  creature  in  perfect  keeping  with  the 
music  and  the  words;  and  though  her  lips  smiled, 
there  was  a  deep,  far-away  look  in  her  eyes  more 
in  harmony  with  the  coming  autumn  than  with 
this  gorgeous  harvest-time. 

For  a  moment  after  she  had  finished  singing 
she  stood  unmoving,  absorbed  by  the  far  horizon; 
then  suddenly  she  gave  a  little  shake  of  the  body 
and  said  in  a  brisk,  playfully  reproving  way: 

"Kitty  Tynan,  Kitty  Tynan,  what  a  girl  you 
are!" 

There  was  no  one  near,  so  far  as  eye  could  see, 
so  it  was  clear  the  words  were  addressed  to  her- 
self. 

She  was  expressing  that  wonder  which  so 
many  folk  feel  at  discovering  in  themselves  char- 
acteristics heretofore  unrecognised,  or  find  them- 
selves doing  things  out  of  their  natural  orbit,  as 
they  think.  If  any  one  had  told  Kitty  Tynan 
that  she  had  rare  imagination  she  would  have 
wondered  what  was  meant.  If  any  one  had  said 
to  her,  "What  are  you  dreaming  about,  Kitty?" 
she  would  have  understood,  however,  for  she  had 
had  fits  of  dreaming  ever  since  she  was  a  child, 
and  these  fits  had  increased  during  the  past  few 
[22] 


"  WHKRE    AWAY    GOES    MY    LAD  ?    TELL    ME    HAS    HE    GONE  ALONE  ?  " 


'PIONEERS,    o 


years — since  the  man  came  to  live  with  them 
whose  coat  she  had  been  brushing.  Perhaps  this 
was  only  imitation,  because  the  man  had  a  habit 
of  standing  or  sitting  still  and  looking  into  space 
for  minutes — and  on  Sundays  for  hours — at  a 
time;  and  often  she  had  watched  him  as  he  lay 
on  his  back  in  the  long  grass,  head  on  a  hillock, 
hat  down  over  his  eyes,  while  the  smoke  from 
his  pipe  came  curling  up  from  beneath  the  rim. 
Also  she  had  seen  him  more  than  once  sitting  with 
a  letter  before  him  and  gazing  at  it  for  many 
minutes  together.  The  curious  thing  was  that  it 
was  the  same  letter  on  each  occasion.  It  was  a 
closed  letter,  and  it  also  was  unstamped.  She 
knew  that,  because  she  had  seen  it  in  his  desk 
— the  desk  once  belonging  to  her  father,  a  slop- 
ing thing  with  a  green-baize  top.  Sometimes  he 
kept  it  locked,  but  very  often  he  did  not;  and 
more  than  once,  when  he  had  asked  her  to  get  him 
something  from  the  desk,  not  out  of  meanness, 
but  chiefly  because  her  moral  standard  had  not 
a  multitude  of  delicate  punctilios,  she  had  looked 
curiously  at  this  letter.  The  envelope  bore  a 
woman's  handwriting,  and  the  name  on  it  was 
not  that  of  the  man  who  owned  the  coat— and 
the  letter.  The  name  on  the  envelope  was  Shiel 
[23] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

Crozier,  but  the  name  of  the  man  who  owned  the 
coat  was  J.  G.  Kerry — James  Gathorne  Kerry, 
so  he  said. 

Kitty  Tynan  had  certainly  enough  imagina- 
tion to  make  her  cherish  a  mystery.  She  won- 
dered greatly  what  it  all  meant.  Never  in  any- 
thing else  had  she  been  inquisitive  or  prying  where 
this  man  was  concerned;  but  she  felt  that  this 
letter  had  the  heart  of  a  story,  and  she  made  up 
fifty  stories  which  she  thought  would  fit  the  case 
of  J.  G.  Kerry,  who  for  over  four  years  had  lived 
in  her  mother's  house.  He  had  become  part  of 
her  life,  perhaps  just  because  he  was  a  man — 
and  what  home  is  a  real  home  without  a  man4? — 
perhaps  because  he  always  had  a  kind,  quiet  word 
for  her,  and  sometimes  a  word  of  buoyant  cheer- 
fulness; indeed,  he  showed  in  his  manner  occa- 
sionally almost  a  boisterous  hilarity.  He  un- 
doubtedly was  what  her  mother  called  "a  queer 
dick,"  but  also  "a  pippin  with  a  perfect  core," 
which  was  her  way  of  saying  that  he  was  a  man 
to  be  trusted  with  herself  and  with  her  daugh- 
ter; who  would  stand  loyally  by  a  friend  or  a 
woman.  He  had  stood  by  them  both  when  Au- 
gustus Burlingame,  the  lawyer,  who  had  boarded 
with  them  when  J.  G.  Kerry  first  came,  coarsely 

[24] 


'PIONEERS,    o    PIONEERS' 

exceeded  the  bounds  of  liberal  friendliness  which 
marked  the  household,  and  by  furtive  attempts 
at  intimacy  began  to  make  life  impossible  for 
both  mother  and  daughter.  Burlingame  took  it 
into  his  head,  when  he  received  notice  that  his 
rooms  were  needed  for  another  boarder,  that  J.  G. 
Kerry  was  the  cause  of  it.  Perhaps  this  was  not 
without  reason,  since  Kerry  had  seen  Kitty  Tynan 
angrily  unclasping  Burlingame's  arm  from 
around  her  waist,  and  had  used  cutting  and  de- 
cisive words  to  the  sensualist  afterwards. 

There  had  taken  the  place  of  Augustus  Bur- 
lingame a  land-agent — Jesse  Bulrush — who 
came  and  went  like  a  catapult,  now  in  domicile 
for  three  days  together,  now  gone  for  three 
weeks;  a  voluble,  gaseous,  humorous  fellow, 
who  covered  up  a  well  of  commercial  eva- 
siveness, honesty  and  adroitness  by  a  perspiring 
gaiety  natural  in  its  origin  and  convenient  for 
harmless  deceit.  He  was  fifty,  and  no  gallant 
save  in  words ;  and  though  a  bachelor  of  so  many 
years'  standing  it  was  a  long  time  before  he 
showed  a  tendency  even  to  blandish  a  good-look- 
ing middle-aged  nurse  named  Egan  who  also 
lodged  with  Mrs.  Tynan;  though  even  a  plain- 
faced  nurse  in  uniform  has  an  advantage  over  a 
[25] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

handsome  unprofessional  woman.  Jesse  Bul- 
rush and  J.  G.  Kerry  were  friends — became  such 
confidential  friends  indeed  to  all  appearance, 
though  their  social  origin  was  evidently  so  dif- 
ferent, that  Kitty  Tynan,  when  she  wished  to 
have  a  pleasant  conversation  which  gave  her  a 
glow  for  hours  after,  talked  to  the  fat  man  of 
his  lean  and  aristocratic-looking  friend. 

"Got  his  head  where  it  ought  to  be — on  his 
shoulders;  and  it  ain't  for  playing  football  with," 
was  the  frequent  remark  of  Mr.  Bulrush  con- 
cerning Mr.  Kerry;  and  this  always  made  Kitty 
Tynan  want  to  sing,  she  could  not  have  told 
why,  save  that  it  seemed  to  her  the  equivalent 
of  a  long  history  of  the  man  whose  past  lay  in 
mists  that  never  lifted,  and  whom  even  the  in- 
quisitive Burlingame  had  been  unable  to  probe 
when  he  lived  in  the  same  house.  But  then 
Kitty  Tynan  was  as  fond  of  singing  as  a  canary, 
and  relieved  her  feelings  constantly  by  this  vir- 
tuous and  becoming  means,  with  her  good  con- 
tralto voice — a  creature  of  contradictions;  for  if 
ever  any  one  should  have  had  a  soprano  voice  it 
was  she.  She  looked  a  soprano. 

What  she  was  thinking  of  as  she  sang  with 
Kerry's  coat  in  her  hand  it  would  be  hard  to  dis- 
[*] 


'PIONEERS,    o    PIONEERS' 

cover  by  the  process  of  elimination,  as  the  de- 
tectives say  when  they  are  searching  for  a 
criminal.  It  is,  however,  of  no  consequence;  but 
it  was  clear  that  the  song  she  sang  had  moved 
her,  for  there  was  the  glint  of  a  tear  in  her  eye 
as  she  turned  towards  the  house,  the  words  of 
the  lyric  singing  themselves  over  in  her  brain: 

"Hereaway  my  heart  was  soft;  when  he  kissed  my  happy 

eyes, 
Held  my  hand,  and  pressed  his  cheek  warm  against 

my  brow, 
Home  I  saw  upon  the  hearth,  heaven  stood  there  in  the 

skies — 
Whereaway,  whereaway  goes  my  lover  now?" 

She  knew  that  no  lover  had  left  her;  that  none 
was  in  the  habit  of  laying  his  warm  cheek  against 
her  brow;  and  perhaps  that  was  why  she  had 
said  aloud  to  herself,  "Kitty  Tynan,  Kitty  Ty- 
nan, what  a  girl  you  are!"  Perhaps — and  per- 
haps not. 

As  she  stepped  forward  towards  the  door  she 
heard  a  voice  within  the  house  and  she  quickened 
her  footsteps.  The  blood  in  her  face,  the  look 
in  her  eye  quickened  also.  A  figure  appeared  at 
the  doorway — a  figure  in  shirt-sleeves,  which 
shook  a  fist  at  the  hurrying  girl. 
[27] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

"Villain!"  he  said  gaily,  for  he  was  in  one 
of  his  ebullient  moods — after  a  long  talk  with 
Jesse  B»lrush.  "Hither  with  my  coat;  my  spot- 
less coat  in  a  spotted  world, — the  unbelievable 
anomaly — 

'For  the  earth  of  a  dusty  to-day 

Is  the  dust  of  an  earthy  to-morrow.'  " 

When  he  talked  like  this  she  did  not  under- 
stand him,  but  she  thought  it  was  clever  beyond 
thinking — a  heavenly  jumble  "If  it  wasn't  for 
me  you'd  be  carted  for  rubbish,"  she  replied  joy- 
ously as  she  helped  him  on  with  his  coat,  though 
he  had  made  a  motion  to  take  it  from  her. 

"I  heard  you  singing — what  was  it*?"  he  asked 
cheerfully  on  the  surface,  though  his  mind  was 
on  weighty  things.  The  song  she  had  sung, 
floating  through  the  air,  had  seemed  familiar  to 
him,  while  he  had  been  greatly  preoccupied 
with  a  big  thing — a  big  business  thing,  which 
he  had  been  planning  for  a  long  time,  with  Jesse 
Bulrush  in  the  background  or  foreground,  as 
scout  or  rear-guard  or  what  you  will. 

'  'Whereaway,  whereaway  goes  the  lad  that  once  was 

mine, 

Hereaway  I  waited  him,  hereaway  and  oft — '  " 
[28] 


'PIONEERS, 


she  hummed  with  an  exaggerated  gaiety  in  her 
voice,  for  the  song  had  made  her  sad,  she  knew 
not  why. 

At  the  words  the  flaming  exhilaration  of  his 
look  vanished,  his  eyes  took  on  a  strange,  poign- 
ant, distant  look. 

"That — oh,  that!"  he  said,  and  with  a  little 
jerk  of  the  head  and  a  clenching  of  the  hand  he 
moved  towards  the  street. 

"Your  hat!"  she  called  after  him,  and  ran  in- 
side the  house.  An  instant  later  she  gave  it  to 
him.  Now  his  face  was  clear  and  his  eyes 
smiled  kindly  at  her. 

"  'Whereaway,  hereaway,'  is  a  wonderful 
song,"  he  said.  "We  used  to  sing  it  when  I  was 
a  boy — and  after,  and  after.  It's  an  old  song 
— as  old  as  the  hills.  Well,  thanks — Kitty  Ty- 
nan. What  a  girl  you  are,  to  be  so  kind  to  a  fel- 
low like  me !"  he  added. 

"Kitty  Tynan,  what  a  girl  you  are" — these 
were  the  very  words  she  had  used  about  her- 
self a  little  while  before.  The  song — why 
did  it  make  Mr.  Kerry  go  so  strange  in  face 
all  in  a  moment  when  he  heard  it4?  Kitty 
watched  him  striding  down  the  street  into  the 
town. 

[29] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

Now  a  voice — a  rich,  quizzical,  kindly  voice 
— called  out  to  her. 

"Come,  come,  Miss  Tynan,  I  want  to  be 
helped  on  with  my  coat,"  it  said. 

Inside  the  house  a  fat,  awkward  man  was 
struggling,  or  pretending  to  struggle,  into  his  coat. 

"Roll  into  it,  Mr.  Roly-poly,"  she  answered 
cheerily  as  she  entered. 

"Of  course  I'm  not  the  star-boarder — nothing 
for  me!"  he  said  in  affected  irony  and  protest. 

"A  little  more  to  starboard  and  you'll  get  the 
coat  on,"  she  retorted  with  a  glint  of  her  late 
father's  raillery,  and  she  gave  the  coat  a  twitch 
which  put  it  right  on  the  ample  shoulders. 

"Bully!  bully!"  he  said;'  "I'll  give  you  the  tip 
for  the  Askatoon  cup." 

"I'm  a  Christian.  I  hate  horse-racers  and 
gamblers,"  she  returned  mockingly. 

"I'll  turn  Christian — I  want  to  be  loved,  not 
hated,"  he  chortled  in  the  doorway. 

"Roll  on,  proud  porpoise!"  she  returned, 
which  shows  that  her  conversation  was  not  quite 
aristocratic  at  all  times. 

"Golly,  but  she's  a  gold  dollar  in  a  gold  bank!" 
Jesse  Bulrush  said  as  he  lurched  into  the  street. 

She  stood  still  in  the  middle  of  the  room  look- 
[30] 


'PIONEERS,    o    PIONEERS' 

ing  down  the  way  the  two  men  had  gone.  The 
quiet  of  the  late  summer  day  surrounded  her. 
She  heard  the  dizzy  din  of  the  bees,  the  sleepy 
grinding  of  the  grasshoppers,  the  sough  of  the 
solitary  pine  at  the  door,  and  then  behind  them 
all  a  whizzing,  machinelike  sound.  This  par- 
ticular sound  went  on  and  on. 

She  opened  the  door  of  the  next  room.  Her 
mother  sat  at  a  sewing-machine  intent  upon  her 
work,  the  needle  eating  up  a  spreading  piece  of 
cloth. 

"What  are  you  making,  mother?"  Kitty  asked. 

"New  blinds  for  Mr.  Kerry's  bedroom — he 
likes  this  green  colour,"  the  widow  added  with 
a  slight  flush  due  to  leaning  over  the  sewing- 
machine,  no  doubt. 

"Everybody  does  everything  for  him,"  re- 
marked the  girl  almost  pettishly. 

"That's  a  nice  spirit,  I  must  say!"  replied  her 
mother,  looking  up  reprovingly,  the  machine  al- 
most stopping. 

"If  I  said  it  in  a  different  way  it  would  be  all 
right,"  the  other  returned  with  a  smile,  and  she 
repeated  the  words  with  a  winning  soft  inflection, 
like  a  born  actress. 

"Kitty — Kitty  Tynan,  what  a  girl  you  are!" 
[si] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

declared  her  mother,  and  she  bent  smiling  over 
the  machine,  which  presently  buzzed  on  its  de- 
vouring way. 

Three  people  had  said  the  same  thing  within 
a  few  minutes.  A  look  of  pleasure  stole  over 
the  girl's  face,  and  her  bosom  rose  and  fell  with 
a  happy  sigh.  Somehow  it  was  quite  a  wonder- 
ful day  for  her. 


CHAPTER  II 
CLOSING   THE   DOORS 


THERE  are  many  people  who,  in  some  sub- 
tle psychological  way,  are  very  like  their 
names;  as  though  some  one  had  whispered  to 
"the  parents  of  this  child"  the  name  designed  for 
it  from  the  beginning  of  time.  So  it  was  with 
Shiel  Crozier.  Does  not  the  name  suggest  a  man 
lean  and  flat,  sinewy,  angular  and  isolated  like 
a  figure  in  one  of  El  Greco's  pictures  in  the  Prado 
at  Madrid4?  Does  not  the  name  suggest  a  figure 
of  elongated  humanity  with  a  touch  of  ancient 
mysticism  and  yet  also  of  the  fantastical  humour 
of  Don  Quixote*? 

In  outward  appearance  Shiel  Crozier,  other- 
wise J.  G.  Kerry,  of  Askatoon,  was  like  his  name 
for  the  greater  part  of  the  time.  Take  him  in 
repose  and  he  looked  a  lank  ascetic  who  dreamed 
of  a  happy  land  where  flagellation  was  a  joy  and 
[33] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

pain  a  panacea.  In  action,  however,  as  when 
Kitty  Tynan  helped  him  on  with  his  coat,  he  was 
a  pure  improvisation  of  nature.  He  had  a  face 
with  a  Cromwellian  mole,  which  broke  out  in  emo- 
tion like  an  April  day,  with  eyes  changing  from 
a  blue-grey  to  the  deepest  ultramarine  that  ever 
delighted  the  soul  and  made  the  reputation  of  an 
Old  Master.  Even  in  the  prairie  town  of  Aska- 
toon,  where  every  man  is  so  busy  that  he  scarcely 
knows  his  own  children  when  he  meets  them,  and 
almost  requires  an  introduction  to  his  wife  when 
the  door  closes  on  them  at  bedtime,  people  took 
a  second  look  at  him  when  he  passed.  Many 
who  came  in  much  direct  contact  with  him,  as 
Augustus  Burlingame  the  lawyer,  had  done,  tried 
to  draw  from  him  all  there  was  to  tell  about  him- 
self; which  is  a  friendly  custom  of  the  far  West. 
The  native-born  greatly  desire  to  tell  about  them- 
selves. They  wear  their  hearts  on  their  sleeves, 
and  are  childlike  in  the  frank  recitals  of  all  they 
were  and  are  and  hope  to  be.  This  covers  up 
also  a  good  deal  of  business  acumen,  shrewdness 
and  secretiveness  which  is  not  so  childlike  and 
bland. 

In  this  they  are  in  sharp  contrast  to  those  not 
native-born.     These  come  from  many  places  on 

[34] 


CLOSING     THE      DOORS 


the  earth,  and  they  are  seldom  garrulously  histor- 
ical. Some  of  them  go  to  the  prairie  country  to 
forget  they  ever  lived  before,  and  to  begin  the 
world  again,  having  been  hurt  in  life  undeserv- 
ingly; some  go  to  bury  their  mistakes  or  worse 
in  pioneer  work  and  adventure;  some  flee  from 
a  wrath  that  would  devour  them — the  law,  soci- 
ety, or  a  woman. 

This  much  must  be  said  at  once  for  Crozier, 
that  he  had  no  crime  to  hide.  It  was  not  be- 
cause of  crime  that  "He  buckles  up  his  mouth  like 
the  bellyband  on  a  bronco,"  as  Malachi  Deely, 
the  exile  from  Tralee,  said  of  him;  and  Deely 
was  a  man  of  "horse-sense,"  no  doubt  because  he 
was  a  horse-doctor — "a  veterenny  surgeon,"  as  his 
friends  called  him  when  they  wished  to  flatter 
him.  Deely  added  to  this  chaste  remark  about 
the  bronco,  that  "Same  as  the  bronco,  you  buckle 
him  tightest  when  you  know  the  divil  is  stirring 
in  his  underbrush."  And  he  added  further, 
"  'Tis  a  woman  that's  put  the  mumplaster  on  his 
tongue,  Sibley,  and  I  bet  you  a  hundred  it's  an- 
other man's  wife." 

Like  many  a  speculator,  Malachi  Deely  would 
have  made  no  profit  out  of  his  bet  in  the  end,  for 
Shiel  Crozier  had  had  no  trouble  with  the  law, 
[35] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

or  with  another  man's  wife,  nor  yet  with  any  sin- 
gle maid — not  yet;  though  there  was  now  Kitty 
Tynan  in  his  path.  Yet  he  had  had  trouble. 
There  was  hint  of  it  in  his  occasional  profound 
abstraction;  but  more  than  all  else  by  the  fact 
that  here  he  was,  a  gentleman,  having  lived  his 
life  for  over  four  years  past  as  a  sort  of  horse- 
expert,  overseer,  and  stud-manager  for  Terry 
Brennan,  the  absentee  millionaire.  In  the  opin- 
ion of  the  West,  "big-bugs"  didn't  come  down 
to  this  kind  of  occupation  unless  they  had  been 
roughly  handled  by  fate  or  fortune — by  the  law, 
society,  or  a  woman. 

"Talk?  Watch  me  now — he  talks  like  a  tes- 
timonial in  a  frame,"  said  Malachi  Deely  on  the 
day  this  tale  opens,  to  John  Sibley,  the  gambling 
young  farmer  who,  strange  to  say,  did  well  out 
of  both  gambling  and  farming. 

"Words  to  him  are  like  nuts  to  a  monkey — 
he's  an  artist,  that  man  is.  Been  in  the  circles 
where  the  band  plays  good  and  soft,  where  the 
music  smells — fairly  smells  like  parfumery,"  re- 
sponded Sibley.  "I'd  like  to  get  at  the  bottom 
of  him.  There's  a  real  good  story  under  his  as- 
bestos vest — something  that'd  make  a  man  call 
for  the  oh-be-joyful,  same  as  I  do  now!" 
[36] 


CLOSING     THE     DOORS 

After  they  had  seen  the  world  through  the  bot- 
tom of  a  tumbler  Deely  continued  the  gossip. 
"Watch  me  now — been  a  friend  of  dukes  in  Eng- 
land and  Ireland,  that  Mr.  James  Gathorne 
Kerry  as  any  one  can  see;  and  there  he  is  now 
feelin'  the  hocks  of  a  filly  or  openin'  the  jaws  of 
a  stud-horse,  age  hunting!  Why,  you  needn't 
tell  me — I've  had  my  mind  made  up  ever  since 
the  day  he  broke  the  temper  of  that  Inniskillen 
chestnut  of  Mr.  Brennan's,  and  won  the  gold  cup 
with  her  afterwards.  He  just  sort  of  appeared 
out  of  the  mist  of  the  marnin',  there  being  a  divil's 
lot  of  excursions  and  conferences  and  holy  gath- 
erings in  Askatoon  that  time  back,  ostensible  for 
the  business  which  their  names  denote,  like  the 
Dioceesan  Conference  and  the  Pure  White  Water 
Society.  That  was  their  bluff;  but  they'd  come 
for  one  good  pure  white  dioceesan  thing  before 
all,  and  that  was  to  see  the  dandiest  horse-racing 
which  ever  infested  the  West.  Come — he  come 
like  that !" — Deely  made  a  motion  like  the  swoop 
of  an  aeroplane  to  earth — "and  here  he  is  buckin' 
about  like  a  rough-neck  same  as  you  and  me ;  but 
yet  a  gent,  a  swell,  a  cream  della  cream,  that's 
turned  his  back  on  a  lady — a  lady  not  his  own 
wife,  that's  my  belief." 

[S7] 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

"You  surely  have  got  women  on  the  brain," 
retorted  Sibley.  "I  ain't  ever  seen  such  a  man 
as  you.  There  never  was  a  woman  crossing  the 
street  on  a  muddy  day  that  you  didn't  sprint  to 
get  a  look  at  her  ankles.  Behind  everything  you 
see  a  woman.  Horses  is  your  profession,  but 
woman  is  your  practice." 

"There  ain't  but  one  thing  worth  living  for, 
and  that's  a  woman,"  remarked  Deely. 

"Do  you  tell  Mrs.  Deely  that1?"  asked  Sibley. 

"Watch  me  now,  she  knows — what  woman 
is  there  don't  know  when  her  husband  is  what 
he  is !  And  it's  how  I  know  that  the  trouble  with 
James  Gathorne  Kerry  is  a  woman.  I  know  the 
signs.  Divils  me  own,  he's  got  'em  in  his  face." 

"He's  got  in  his  face  what  don't  belong  here 
and  what  you  don't  know  much  about — never 
having  kept  company  with  that  sort,"  retorted 
Sibley. 

"The  way  he  lives  and  talks — 'No,  thank  you, 
I  don't  care  for  anny  thing,'  says  he,  when  you're 
standin'  at  the  door  of  a  friendly  saloon,  which 
is  established  by  law  to  bespeak  peace  and  good- 
will towards  men,  and  you  ask  him  pleasant  to 
come.  He  don't  seem  to  have  a  single  vice. 
Haven't  we  tried  him?  There  was  Belle  Bing- 
[38] 


CLOSING     THE      DOORS 


ley,  all  frizzy  hair  and  a  kicker,  we  put  her  onto 
him.  But  he  give  her  ten  dollars  to  buy  a  hat 
on  condition  she  behaved  like  a  lady  in  the  future 
— smilin'  at  her,  the  divil !  And  Belle,  with  tem- 
per like  dinnemite,  took  it  kneelin',  as  it  were, 
and  smiled  back  at  him — her!  Drink,  women — 
nothin'  seems  to  have  a  hold  on  him.  What's 
his  vice?  Sure,  then,  that's  what  I  say — what's 
his  vice?  He's  got  to  have  one — anny  man  as 
is  a  man  has  to  have  one  vice." 

"Bosh!  Look  at  me,"  rejoined  Sibley. 
"Drink — women — nit!  Not  for  me!  I've  got 
no  vice.  I  don't  even  smoke." 

"No  vice?  Begobs,  yours  has  got  you  like  a 
tire  on  a  wheel !  Vice — what  do  you  call  gam- 
blin"?  It's  the  biggest  vice  ever  tuk  grip  of  a 
man.  It's  like  a  fever,  and  it's  got  you,  John, 
like  the  nail  on  your  finger." 

"Well,  p'r'aps,  he's  got  that  vice,  too — p'r'aps 
J.  G.  Kerry's  got  that  vice  same  as  me." 

"Annyhow,  we'll  get  to  know  all  we  want 
when  he  goes  into  the  witness  box  at  the  Logan 
murder  trial  next  week — that's  what  I'm  waitin' 
for,"  Deely  returned  with  a  grin  of  anticipation. 
"That  opium-eating  Gus  Burlingame's  got  a 
grudge  against  him  somehow,  and  when  a  law- 

[39] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

yer's  got  a  grudge  against  you  it's  just  as  well  to 
look  where  y'  are  goin'.  Burlingame  don't  care 
what  he  does  to  get  his  way  in  court.  What  set 
him  against  Kerry  I  ain't  sure,  but,  bedad,  I  think 
it's  looks.  Burlingame  goes  in  for  looking  like 
a  picture  in  a  frame — gold  seals  hangin'  beyant 
his  vest-pocket,  broad  silk  cord  to  his  eye-glass, 
loose  flowin'  tie,  and  long  hair — makes  him  look 
pretentuous  and  showy.  But  your  'Mr.  Kerry, 
sir,'  he  don't  have  anny  tricks  to  make  him  look 
like  a  doge  from  Veenis  and  all  the  eyes  of  the 
females  battin'  where'er  he  goes.  Jealousy,  John 
Sibley,  me  boy,  is  a  cruil  thing." 

"Why  is  it  you  ain't  jealous  of  him?  There's 
plenty  of  women  that  watch  you  go  down- town 
— you  got  a  name  for  it,  anyway,"  remarked 
Sibley  maliciously. 

Deely  nodded  sagely.  "Watch  me  now,  that's 
right,  me  boy!  I  got  a  name  for  it,  but  I  want 
the  game  without  the  name,  and  that's  why  I  ain't 
puttin'  on  anny  airs — none  at  all.  I  depend  on 
me  tongue,  not  on  me  looks,  which  goes  against 
me.  I  like  Mr.  J.  G.  Kerry.  I've  plenty  deal- 
in's  with  him,  naturally,  both  of  us  being  in  the 
horse  business,  and  I  say  he's  right  as  a  gold  dol- 
lar as  he  goes  now.  Also,  and  behold,  I'd  take 

[40] 


CLOSING     THE      DOORS 


my  oath  he  never  done  anything  to  blush  for. 
His  trouble's  been  a  woman — wayward  woman 
what  stoops  to  folly!  I  give  up  tryin'  to  pump 
him  just  as  soon  as  I  made  up  my  mind  it  was  a 
woman.  That  shuts  a  man's  mouth  like  a  poor- 
box." 

"Next  week's  fixed  for  the  Logan  killin'  case, 
is  it?" 

"Monday  comin',  for  sure.  I  wouldn't  like  to 
be  in  Mr.  Kerry's  shoes.  Watch  me  now,  if  he 
gives  the  evidence  they  say  he  can  give — the 
prasecution  say  it — that  Macmahon  Gang  behind 
Logan  '11  get  him  sure  as  guns,  one  way  or  an- 
other." 

"Some  one  ought  to  give  Mr.  Kerry  the  tip  to 
get  out  and  not  give  evidence,"  remarked  Sibley 
sagely. 

Deely  shook  his  head  vigorously.  "Begobs, 
he's  had  the  tip  all  right,  but  he's  not  goin'.  He's 
got  as  much  fear  as  a  canary  has  whiskers.  He 
doesn't  want  to  give  evidence,  he  says,  but  he 
wants  to  see  the  law  do  its  work.  Burlingame  '11 
try  to  make  it  out  manslaughter;  but  there's  a 
widow  with  three  children  to  suffer  for  the  man- 
slaughter, just  as  much  as  though  it  was  murder, 
and  there  isn't  a  man  that  doesn't  think  murder 
[41] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

was  the  game,  and  the  grand  joory  had  that  idea, 
too." 

"Between  Gus  Burlingame  and  that  Mac- 
mahon  bunch  of  horse-thieves,  the  stranger  in  a 
strange  land  '11  have  to  keep  his  eyes  open,  I'm 
thinkin'." 

"Divils  me  darlin',  his  eyes  are  open  all  right," 
returned  Deely. 

"Still  I'd  like  to  jog  his  elbow,"  Sibley  an- 
swered reflectively.  "It  couldn't  do  any  harm, 
and  it  might  do  good." 

Deely  nodded  good-naturedly.  "If  you  want 
to  so  bad  as  that,  John,  you've  got  the  chance, 
for  he's  up  at  the  Sovereign  Bank  now.  I  seen 
him  leave  the  Great  Overland  Railway  Bureau 
ten  minutes  ago  and  get  away  quick  to  the  bank." 

^What's  he  got  on  at  the  bank  and  the  rail- 
way?" 

"Oh,  but  it's  some  big  deal.  I've  seen  him 
with  Studd  Bradley—" 

"The  Great  North  Trust  Company  boss?' 

"On  it,  my  boy,  on  it — the  other  day  as  thick 
as  thieves.  Studd  Bradley  doesn't  knit  up  with 
an  outsider  from  the  old  country  unless  there's 
reason  for  it — good  gold-currency  reasons." 

"A  land  deal,  eh?"  ventured  Sibley.  "What 
[42] 


CLOSING     THE     DOORS 

did  I  say — speculation,  that's  his  vice,  same  as 
mine!  P'r'aps  that's  what  ruined  him.  Cards, 
speculation,  what's  the  difference *?  And  he's 
got  a  quiet  look — same  as  me." 

Deely  laughed  loudly.  "And  bursts  out  same 
as  you!  Quiet  one  hour  like  a  mill-pond  or  a 
well,  and  then — whisk,  he's  blazin' !  He's  a 
volcano  in  harness,  that  spalpeen." 

"He's  a  volcano  that  doesn't  erupt  when 
there's  danger,"  responded  Sibley.  "It's  when 
there's  just  fun  on  that  his  volcano  gets  loose. 
I'll  go  wait  for  him  at  the  bank.  I  got  a  fellow- 
feeling  for  Mr.  Kerry.  I'd  like  to  whisper  in  his 
ear  that  he'd  better  be  lookin'  sharp  for  the  Mac- 
mahon  Gang,  and  that  if  he's  a  man  of  peace  he'd 
best  take  a  holiday  till  after  next  week,  or  get 
smallpox  or  something." 

The  two  friends  lounged  slowly  up  the  street, 
and  presently  parted  near  the  door  of  the  bank. 
As  Sibley  waited,  his  attention  was  drawn  to  a 
window  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  street  at  an 
angle  from  themselves.  The  light  was  such  that 
the  room  was  revealed  to  its  farthest  corners,  and 
Sibley  noted  that  three  men  were  evidently  care- 
fully watching  the  bank,  and  that  one  of  the  men 
was  Studd  Bradley,  the  so-called  boss.  The 

[43] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

others  were  local  men  of  some  weight  and  position 
commercially  and  financially  in  the  town.  Sibley 
did  not  give  any  sign  that  he  noticed  the  three 
men,  but  he  watched  carefully  from  under  the 
rim  of  his  hat.  His  observant  imagination,  how- 
ever, read  a  story  of  consequence  in  the  secretive 
vigilance  of  the  three,  who  evidently  thought 
that,  standing  far  back  in  the  room,  they  could 
not  be  seen. 

Presently  the  door  of  the  bank  opened,  and 
Sibley  saw  Studd  Bradley  lean  forward  eagerly, 
then  draw  back  and  speak  hurriedly  to  his  com- 
panions, using  a  gesture  of  satisfaction. 

"Something  damn  funny  there!"  Sibley  said  to 
himself,  and  stepped  forward  to  Crazier  with  a 
friendly  exclamation. 

Crozier  turned  rather  impatiently,  for  his  face 
was  aflame  with  some  exciting  reflection.  At  this 
moment  his  eyes  were  the  deepest  blue  that  could 
be  imagined — an  almost  impossible  colour,  like 
that  of  the  Mediterranean  when  it  reflects  the 
perfect  sapphire  of  the  sky.  There  was  some- 
thing almost  wonderful  in  their  expression.  A 
woman  once  said  as  she  looked  at  a  picture  of 
Herschel,  whose  eyes  had  the  unworldly  gaze  of 
the  great  dreamer  looking  beyond  this  sphere, 

[44] 


CLOSING     THE     DOORS 

"The  stars  startled  him."  Such  a  look  was  in 
Crozier's  eyes  now,  as  though  he  was  seeing  the 
bright  end  of  a  long  road,  the  desire  of  his 
soul. 

That,  indeed,  was  what  he  saw.  After  two 
years  of  secret  negotiation  he  had  (from  acci- 
dental knowledge  got  from  Jesse  Bulrush,  his  fel- 
low-boarder) come  to  the  accomplishment  of  a  big 
land  deal  in  relation  to  the  route  of  a  new  rail- 
way and  a  town-site,  which  would  mean  more  to 
him  than  any  one  could  know.  If  it  went 
through  he  would  have  for  an  investment  of  ten 
thousand  dollars  a  hundred  and  fifty  thousand 
dollars;  and  that  would  solve  an  everlasting 
problem  for  him. 

He  had  reached  a  critical  point  in  his  enter- 
prise. All  that  was  wanted  now  was  ten  thou- 
sand dollars  in  cash  to  enable  him  to  close  the 
great  bargain  and  make  his  hundred  and  fifty 
thousand.  But  to  want  ten  thousand  dollars 
and  to  get  it  in  a  given  space  of  time,  when  you 
have  neither  securities,  cash,  nor  real  estate,  is 
enough  to  keep  you  awake  at  night.  Crozier  had 
been  so  busy  getting  the  big  business  of  the  deal 
in  shape  that  he  had  not  deeply  concerned  him- 
self with  the  absence  of  the  necessary  ten  thou- 

[45] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

sand  dollars.  He  thought  that  he  could  get  the 
money  at  any  time,  so  good  was  the  proposition; 
and  it  was  best  to  leave  raising  the  money  to  the 
last  moment  to  avoid  some  one  else  cutting  in 
and  forestalling  him.  He  must  first  have  the 
stake  to  be  played  for  before  he  moved  to  get 
the  money  with  which  to  make  the  throw.  This 
is  not  generally  thought  a  good  way,  but  it  was 
his  way,  and  it  had  yet  to  be  tested. 

There  was  no  cloud  of  apprehension,  however, 
in  Crozier's  eyes  as  they  met  those  of  Sibley.  He 
liked  Sibley.  At  this  point  it  is  not  necessary  to 
say  why.  The  reason  will  appear  in  due  time. 
Sibley's  face  had  always  something  of  that  im- 
mobility and  gravity  which  Crozier's  face  had 
part  of  the  time — paler,  less  intelligent,  with 
dark  lines  and  secret  shadows  which  Crozier's 
face  had  not;  but  still  with  some  of  the  El  Greco 
characteristics  which  marked  so  powerfully  that 
of  Shiel  Crozier,  who  passed  as  J.  G.  Kerry. 

"Ah,  Sibley,"  he  said,  "glad  to  see  you !  Any- 
thing I  can  do  for  you*?" 

"It's  the  other  way  if  there's  any  doing  at  all," 
was  the  quick  response. 

"Well,  let's  walk  along  together,"  remarked 
Crozier  cheerfully,  though  a  little  abstractedly, 

[46] 


CLOSING     THE      DOORS 


for  he  was  thinking  hard  about  his  great  enter- 
prise. 

"We  might  be  seen,"  said  Sibley,  with  an 
obvious  undermeaning  meant  to  provoke  a  ques- 
tion. 

Crozier  caught  the  undertone  of  suggestion. 
"Being  about  to  burgle  the  '  ank,  it's  well  not  to 
be  seen  together — eh*?" 

"No,  I'm  not  in  on  that  business,  Mr.  Kerry. 
I'm  for  breaking  banks,  not  burgling  'em,'1  was 
the  grim,  merry  reply. 

They  laughed,  but  Crozier  knew  that  the  ob- 
servant gambling  farmer  was  not  talking  at  hap- 
hazard. They  had  met  on  the  highway,  as  it 
were,  many  times  since  Crozier  had  come  to 
Askatoon,  and  Crozier  knew  his  man. 

"Well,  what  are  we  going  to  do  and  who  will 
see  us  if  we  do  it?"  Crozier  asked  briskly. 

"Studd  Bradley  and  his  secret-service  corps 
have  got  their  eyes  on  this  street — and  on  you," 
returned  Sibley  dryly. 

Crozier's  face  sobered  from  its  exhilaration 
and  his  eyes  became  less  emotional.  "I  don't  see 
them  anywhere,"  he  answered,  but  looking  no- 
where. 

"They're  in  Gus  Burlingame's  office.  They 
[47] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

had  you  under  observation  while  you  were  in 
the  bank." 

"I  couldn't  run  off  with  the  land,  could  I*?" 
Crozier  remarked  dryly,  yet  suggestively,  in  his 
desire  to  see  how  much  Sibley  knew. 

"Well,  you  said  it  was  a  bank.  I've  no  more 
idea  what  it  is  you'ie/trying  to  run  off  with  than 
I  know  what  an  ace  is  going  to  do  when  there's 
a  joker  in  the  pack,"  remarked  Sibley;  "but  I 
thought  I'd  tell  you  that  Bradley  and  his  lot  are 
watchin'  you  gettin'  ready  to  run."  Then  he 
hastily  told  what  he  had  seen. 

Crozier  was  reassured.  It  was  natural  that 
Bradley  &  Co.  should  take  an  interest  in  his  move- 
ments. They  would  make  a  pile  of  money  if  he 
pulled  off  the  deal — far  more  than  he  would.  It 
wasn't  strange  that  they  should  watch  him  going 
into  the  bank.  They  knew  he  wanted  money, 
and  a  bank  was  the  place  to  get  it.  That  was 
the  way  he  viewed  the  matter  on  the  instant. 
He  replied  to  Sibley  cheerfully. 

"A  hundred  to  one  is  a  lot  when  you  win  it," 
he  said  enigmatically. 

"It  depends  on  how  much  you  have  on,"  was 
Sibley's "quiet  reply — "a  dollar  or  a  thousand  dol- 
lars. If  you've  got  a  big  thing  on,  and  you've 
[48] 


CLOSING     THE      DOORS 


got  an  outsider  that  you  think  is  going  to  win 
and  beat  the  favourite,  it's  just  as  well  to  run 
no  risks.  Believe  me,  Mr.  Kerry,  if  you've  got 
anything  on  that  asks  for  your  attention,  it'd  be 
sense  and  saving  if  you  didn't  give  evidence  at 
the  Logan  Trial  next  week.  It's  pretty  well 
guessed  what  you're  going  to  say  and  what  you 
know,  and  you  take  it  from  me,  the  Macmahon 
mob  that's  behind  Logan  '11  have  it  in  for  you. 
They're  terrors  when  they  get  goin',  and  if  your 
evidence  puts  one  of  that  lot  away,  there'll  be 
trouble  for  you.  I  wouldn't  do  it — honest,  I 
wouldn't.  I've  been  out  West  here  a  good  many 
years,  and  I  know  the  place  and  the  people.  It's 
a  good  place  and  there's  lots  of  first-class  people 
here,  but  there's  a  few  offscourings  that  hang  like 
wolves  on  the  edge  of  the  sheep  fold,  ready  to 
murder  and  git." 

"tfhaf  was  what  you  wanted  to  see  me  about, 
wasn't  it?"  Crozier  asked  quietly. 

"Yes;  the  other  was  just  a  shot  on  the  chance. 
I  don't  like  to  see  men  sneaking  about  and  watch- 
ing. If  they  do,  you  can  bet  there's  something 
wrong.  But  the  other  thing,  the  Logan  Trial 
business,  is  a  dead  certainty.  You're  only  a 
newcomer,  in  a  kind  of  way,  and  you  don't  need 

[49] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

to  have  the  same  responsibility  as  the  rest.  The 
Law  '11  get  what  it  wants  whether  you  chip  in  or 
not.  Let  it  alone.  What's  the  Law  ever  done 
for  you  that  you  should  run  risks  for  it*?  It's 
straight  talk,  Mr.  Kerry.  Have  a  cancer  in  the 
bowels  next  week  or  go  off  to  see  a  dying  brother, 
but  don't  give  evidence  at  the  Logan  Trial — 
don't  do  it.  I  got  a  feeling — I'm  superstitious — 
all  sportsmen  are.  By  following  my  instincts 
I've  saved  myself  a  whole  lot  in  my  time." 

"Yes,  all  men  that  run  chances  have  their  su- 
perstitions, and  they're  not  to  be  sneered  at,"  re- 
plied Crozier  thoughtfully.  "If  you  see  black, 
don't  play  white;  if  you  see  a  chestnut  crumpled 
up,  put  your  money  on  the  bay  even  when  the 
chestnut  is  a  favourite.  Of  course  you're  super- 
stitious, Sibley.  The  tan  and  the  green  baize 
are  covered  with  ghosts  that  want  to  help  you, 
if  you'll  let  them." 

Sibley's  mouth  opened  in  amazement.  Crozier 
was  speaking  with  the  look  of  the  man  who 
hypnotizes  himself,  who  "sees  things,"  who 
dreams  as  only  the  gambler  and  the  plunger  on 
the  turf  do  dream,  not  even  excepting  the  latter- 
day  Irish  poets. 

"Say,  I  was  right  what  I  said  to  Deely — I  was 
[50] 


CLOSING     THE     DOORS 


right,"  remarked  Sibley  almost  huskily,  for  it 
seemed  to  him  as  though  he  had  found  a  long- 
lost  brother.  No  man  except  one  who  had  staked 
all  he  had  again  and  again  could  have  looked  or 
spoken  like  that. 

Crozier  looked  at  the  other  thoughtfully  for  a 
moment,  then  he  said: 

"I  don't  know  what  you  said  to  Deely,  but  I 
do  know  that  I'm  going  to  the  Logan  Trial  in 
spite  of  the  Macmahon  mob.  I  don't  feel  about 
it  as  you  do.  I've  got  a  different  feeling,  Sibley. 
I'll  play  the  game  out.  I  shall  not  hedge.  I 
shall  not  play  for  safety.  It's  everything  on  the 
favourite  this  time." 

"You'll  excuse  me,  but  morphia-sucking  Gus 
Burlingame  is  for  the  defence,  and  he's  got  his 
knife  into  you,"  returned  Sibley. 

"Not  yet."  Crozier  smiled  almost  sardonic- 
ally. 

"Well,  I  apologise,  but  what  I've  said,  Mr. 
Kerry,  is  said  as  man  to  man.  You're  ridin* 
game  in  a  tough  place,  as  any  man  has  to  do  who 
starts  with  only  his  pants  and  his  head  on. 
That's  the  way  you  begun  here,  I  guess;  and  I 
don't  want  to  see  your  horse  tumble  because  some 
«ne  throws  a  fence-rail  at  its  legs.  Your  class 
[51] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

has  enemies  always  in  a  new  country — jealousy, 
envy." 

The  lean,  aristocratic,  angular  Crozier,  with  a 
musing  look  on  his  long  face,  grown  ascetic  again, 
as  he  held  out  his  hand  and  gripped  that  of  the 
other,  said  warmly:  "I'm  just  as  much  obliged 
to  you  as  though  I  took  your  advice,  Sibley.  I 
am  not  taking  it,  but  I  am  taking  a  pledge  to 
return  the  compliment  to  you  if  ever  I  get  the 
chance." 

"Well,  most  men  get  chances  of  that  kind," 
was  the  gratified  reply  of  the  gambling  farmer, 
and  then  Crozier  turned  quickly  and  entered  the 
doorway  of  the  British  Bank,  the  rival  of  that 
from  which  he  had  turned  in  disappointment  a 
little  while  before. 

Left  alone  in  the  street,  Sibley  looked  back 
with  the  instinct  of  the  hunter.  As  he  expected, 
he  saw  a  head  thrust  out  from  the  window  where 
Studd  Bradley  and  his  friends  had  been.  There 
was  a  hotel  opposite  the  British  Bank.  He  en- 
tered and  waited.  Bradley  and  one  of  his  com- 
panions presently  came  in  and  seated  themselves 
far  back  in  the  shadow,  where  they  could  watch 
the  doorway  of  the  bank. 

It  was  quite  a  half-hour  before  Shiel  Crozier 

[52] 


CLOSING     THE     DOORS 

emerged  from  the  bank.  His  face  was  set  and 
pale.  For  an  instant  he  stood  as  though  won- 
dering which  way  to  go,  then  he  moved  up  the 
street  the  way  he  had  come. 

Sibley  heard  a  low,  poisonous  laugh  of  tri- 
umph rankle  through  the  hotel  office.  He  turned 
round.  Bradley,  the  overfed,  overconfident, 
overestimated  financier,  laid  his  hand  on  the 
shoulder  of  his  companion  as  they  moved  towards 
the  door. 

"That's  another  gate  shut,"  he  said.  "I  guess 
we  can  close  'em  all  with  a  little  care.  It's 
working  all  right.  He's  got  no  chance  of  rais- 
ing the  cash,"  he  added,  as  the  two  passed  the 
chair  where  Sibley  sat  with  his  hat  over  his  eyes, 
chewing  an  unlighted  cigar. 

"I  don't  know  what  it  is,  but  it's  dirt — and 
muck  at  that,"  John  Sibley  remarked  as  he  rose 
from  his  chair  and  followed  the  two  into  the 
street. 

Bradley  and  his  friends  were  trying  steadily  to 
close  up  the  avenues  of  credit  to  the  man  to  whom 
the  success  of  his  enterprise  meant  so  much.  To 
crowd  him  out  would  mean  an  extra  hundred  and 
fifty  thousand  dollars  for  themselves. 

[53] 


CHAPTER  III 

THE   LOGAN    TRIAL   AND 
WHAT    CAME    OF   IT 


WHAT  the  case  was  in  which  Shiel  Crozier 
was  to  give  evidence  is  not  important; 
what  came  from  the  giving  of  his  testimony  is 
all  that  matters;  and  this  story  would  never  have 
been  written  if  he  had  not  entered  the  witness- 
box. 

A  court-room  at  any  time  seems  a  little  warmer 
than  any  other  spot  to  all  except  the  prisoner ;  but 
on  a  July  day  it  is  likely  to  be  a  punishment  for 
both  innocent  and  guilty.  A  man  had  been 
killed  by  one  of  the  group  of  toughs  called 
locally  the  Macmahon  Gang,  and  against  the 
charge  of  murder  that  of  manslaughter  had  been 
set  up  in  defence;  and  manslaughter  might  mean 
jail  for  a  year  or  two  or  no  jail  at  all.  Any  evi- 
dence which  justified  the  charge  of  murder  would 
mean  not  jail,  but  the  rope  in  due  course;  for 

[54] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 

this  was  not  Montana  or  Idaho  where  the  law's 
delays  outlasted  even  the  memory  of  the  crime 
committed. 

The  court-room  of  Askatoon  was  crowded  to 
suffocation,  for  the  Macmahons  were  detested, 
and  the  murdered  man  had  a  good  reputation  in 
the  district.  Besides,  a  widow  and  three  chil- 
dren mourned  their  loss,  and  the  widow  was  in 
court.  Also  Crozier's  evidence  was  expected  to 
be  sensational,  and  to  prove  the  swivel  on  which 
the  fate  of  the  accused  man  would  hang.  Among 
those  on  the  inside  it  was  also  known  that  the 
clever  but  dissipated  Augustus  Burlingame,  the 
counsel  for  the  prisoner,  had  a  grudge  against 
Crozier — no  one  quite  knew  why  except  Kitty 
Tynan  and  her  mother — and  that  cross-examina- 
tion would  be  pressed  mercilessly  when  Crozier 
entered  the  witness-box.  As  Burlingame  came 
into  the  court-room  he  said  to  the  Young  Doctor, 
— he  was  always  spoken  of  as  the  Young  Doctor 
in  Askatoon,  though  he  had  been  there  a  good 
many  years  and  he  was  no  longer  as  young  as  he 
looked — who  was  also  called  as  a  witness,  "We'll 
know  more  about  Mr.  J.  G.  Kerry  when  this 
trial  is  over  than  will  suit  his  book."  It  did  not 
occur  to  Augustus  Burlingame  that  Crozier  might 

[55] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

find  a  way  of  throwing  doubt  on  the  fitness  of  the 
lawyer  to  represent  innocence  or  the  law,  in  view 
of  the  reason  why  he  had  fled  the  house  of  the 
showy  but  virtuous  Mrs.  Tynan. 

Crozier  entered  the  witness-box  at  a  stage  when 
excitement  was  at  fever  height;  for  the  Mac- 
mahon  Gang  had  given  evidence  which  every  one 
believed  to  be  perjured;  and  the  widow  of  the 
slain  man  was  weeping  bitterly  in  her  seat  because 
of  noxious  falsehoods  sworn  against  her  honest 
husband. 

There  was  certainly  something  very  credible 
and  prepossessing  in  the  appearance  of  Crozier. 
He  might  be  this  or  that,  but  he  carried  no  evil 
or  vice  of  character  in  his  face.  He  was  in  his 
grave  mood  this  summer  afternoon.  There  he 
stood  with  his  long  face  and  the  very  heavy  eye- 
brows, clean-shaven,  hard-bitten,  as  though  by 
wind  and  weather,  composed  and  forceful,  the 
mole  on  his  chin  a  kind  of  challenge  to  the  verti- 
cal dimple  in  his  cheek,  his  high  forehead  more 
benevolent  than  intellectual,  his  brown  hair 
faintly  sprinkled  with  gray  and  a  bit  unmanage- 
able, his  fathomless  eyes  shining. 

"No  man  ought  to  have  such  eyes,"  remarked 
a  woman  present  to  the  Young  Doctor,  who  ab- 
[56] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 


stractedly  nodded  assent,  for  like  Malachi  Deely 
and  John  Sibley,  he  himself  had  a  theory  about 
Crozier;  and  he  had  a  fear  of  what  the  savage 
enmity  of  the  morally  and  physically  diseased 
Burlingame  might  do.  He  had  made  up  his 
mind  that  so  intense  a  scrupulousness  as  Crozier 
had  shown  since  coming  to  Askatoon  had  behind 
it  not  only  character,  but  the  rigidity  of  a  set 
purpose;  and  that  view  was  supported  by  the 
stern  economy  of  Crozier's  daily  life,  broken  only 
by  sudden  bursts  of  generosity  for  those  in  need. 

In  the  box  Crozier  kept  his  eye  on  the  crown 
attorney,  who  prosecuted,  and  on  the  judge.  He 
appeared  not  to  see  any  one  in  the  court-room, 
though  Kitty  Tynan  had  so  placed  herself  that 
he  must  see  her  if  he  looked  at  the  audience  at 
all.  Kitty  thought  him  magnificent  as  he  told 
his  story  with  a  simply  parsimony,  but  a  thrilling 
choice  of  words  which  made  every  syllable  poign- 
ant with  effect.  She  liked  him  in  his  grave 
mood  even  better  than  when  he  was  afflame  with 
an  internal  fire  of  his  own  creation,  when  he  was 
almost  wildly  vivid  with  life. 

"He's  two  men,"  she  had  often  said  to  herself; 
and  she  said  it  now  as  she  looked  at  him  in  the 
witness-box,  measuring  out  his  words  and  meas- 
[57] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

uring  off  at  the  same  time  the  span  of  a  mur- 
derer's life;  for  when  the  crown  attorney  said  to 
the  judge  that  he  had  concluded  his  examination 
there  was  no  one  in  the  room — not  even  the 
graceless  Burlingame,  who  did  not  think  the 
prisoner  guilty. 

"That  is  all,"  the  crown  attorney  said  to 
Crozier  as  he  sank  into  his  chair,  greatly  pleased 
with  one  of  the  best  witnesses  who  had  ever  been 
through  his  hands — lucid,  concentrated,  exact, 
knowing  just  where  he  was  going  and  reaching  his 
goal  without  meandering.  Crozier  was  about  to 
step  down  when  Burlingame  rose. 

"I  wish  to  ask  a  few  questions,"  he  said. 

Crozier  bowed  and  turned,  again  grasping  the 
rail  of  the  witness-box  with  one  hand,  while  with 
an  air  of  both  cogitation  and  suspense  he  stroked 
his  chin  with  the  long  fingers  of  the  other  hand. 

"What  is  your  name*?"  asked  Burlingame  in  a 
tone  a  little  louder  than  he  had  used  hitherto  in 
the  trial,  indeed  even  louder  than  lawyers  gen- 
erally use  when  they  want  to  bully  a  witness. 
In  this  case  it  was  as  though  he  wished  to  sum- 
mon and  startle  the  attention  of  the  court. 

For  a  second  Crozier's  fingers  caught  his  chin 
almost  spasmodically.  The  real  meaning  of  the 
[58] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 


question,  what  lay  behind  it,  flashed  to  his  mind. 
He  saw  in  lightning  illumination  the  course 
Burlingame  meant  to  pursue.  For  a  moment  his 
heart  seemed  to  stand  still,  and  he  turned  slightly 
pale,  but  the  blue  of  his  eyes  took  on  a  new  steely 
look — a  look  also  of  striking  watchfulness,  as  of 
an  animal  conscious  of  its  danger,  yet  conscious, 
too,  of  its  power  when  at  bay. 

"What  is  your  name*?"  Burlingame  asked 
again  in  a  somewhat  louder  tone,  and  turned  to 
look  at  the  jury,  as  if  bidding  them  note  the  hesi- 
tation of  the  witness;  though,  indeed,  the  wait- 
ing was  so  slight  that  none  but  a  trickster  like 
Burlingame  would  have  taken  advantage  of  it, 
and  only  then  when  there  was  much  behind. 

For  a  moment  longer  Crozier  remained  silent, 
getting  strength,  as  it  were,  and  saying  to  him- 
self, "What  does  he  know*?"  and  then,  with  a 
composed  look  of  inquiry  at  the  judge,  who  ap- 
peared to  take  no  notice,  he  said:  "I  have  al- 
ready, in  evidence,  given  my  name  to  the  court." 

"Witness,  what  is  your  name*?"  again  almost 
shouted  the  lawyer  with  a  note  of  indignation  in 
his  voice,  as  though  here  was  a  dangerous  fellow 
committing  a  misdemeanour  in  their  very  presence. 
He  spread  out  his  hands  to  the  jury,  as  though 

[59] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

bidding  them  observe,  if  they  would,  this  witness 
hesitating  in  answer  to  a  simple,  primary  ques- 
tion— a  witness  who  had  just  sworn  a  man's  life 
away! 

"What  is  your  name*?" 

"James  Gathorne  Kerry,  as  I  have  already 
given  it  to  the  court." 

"Where  do  you  live?" 

"In  Askatoon,  as  I  have  already  said  in  evi- 
dence; and  if  it  is  necessary  to  give  my  domicile, 
I  live  at  the  house  of  Mrs.  Tyndall  Tynan,  Pearl 
Street — as  you  know." 

The  tone  in  which  he  uttered  the  last  few 
words  was  such  that  even  the  judge  pricked  up 
his  ears. 

A  look  of  hatred  came  into  the  decadent  but 
able  lawyer's  face. 

"Where  do  you  live  when  you  are  at  home*?" 

"The  house  of  Mrs.  Tynan  is  the  only  home  I 
have  at  present." 

He  was  outwitting  the  pursuer  so  far,  but  it 
only  gained  him  time,  as  he  knew;  and  he  knew 
also  that  no  suggestive  hint  concerning  the  episode 
at  Mrs.  Tynan's,  when  Burlingame  was  asked  to 
leave  her  house,  would  be  of  any  avail  now. 

"Where  were  you  born?" 
[60] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 

"In  Ireland." 

"What  part  of  Ireland?" 

"County  Kerry." 

"What  place — what  town  or  city  or  village  in 
County  Kerry?" 

"In  neither." 

"What  house,  then — what  estate?"  Burlin- 
game  was  more  than  nettled;  and  he  sharpened 
his  sword. 

"The  estate  of  Castlegarry." 

"What  was  your  name  in  Ireland?" 

In  the  short  silence  that  followed  the  quick 
drawn  breath  of  many  excited  and  some  agitated 
people  could  be  heard.  Among  the  latter  were 
Mrs.  Tynan  and  her  daughter  and  Malachi 
Deely;  among  those  who  held  their  breath  in 
suspense  were  John  Sibley,  Studd  Bradley,  the 
financier,  and  the  Young  Doctor.  The  swish  of 
a  skirt  seemed  ridiculously  loud  in  the  hush,  and 
the  scratching  of  the  judge's  quill  pen  was  noisily 
irritating. 

"My  name  in  Ireland  was  James  Shiel  Ga- 
thorne  Crozier,  commonly  called  Shiel  Crozier," 
came  the  calm  reply  from  the  witness-box. 

"James  Shiel  Gathorne  Crozier  in  Ireland,  but 
James  Gathorne  Kerry  here !"  Burlingame  turned 
[61] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

to  the  jury  significantly.  "What  other  name 
have  you  been  known  by  in  or  out  of  Ireland?" 
he  added  sharply  to  Crozier. 

"No  other  name  so  far  as  I  know." 

"No  other  name  so  far  as  you  know,"  repeated 
the  lawyer  in  a  sarcastic  tone  intended  tr  impress 
the  court. 

"Who  was  your  father4?" 

"John  Gathorne  Crozier." 

"Any  title?" 

"He  was  a  baronet." 

"What  was  his  business?" 

"He  had  no  profession,  though  he  had  business, 
of  course." 

"Ah,  he  lived  by  his  wits?" 

"No,  he  was  not  a  lawyer!  I  have  said  he  had 
no  profession.  He  lived  on  his  money  on  his 
estate." 

The  judge  waved  down  the  laughter  at  Burlin- 
game's  expense. 

"In  official  documents  what  was  his  descrip- 
tion?" snarled  Burlingame. 

"  'Gentleman'  was  his  designation  in  official 
documents." 

"You,  then,  were  the  son  of  a  gentleman?" 
There  was  a  hateful  suggestion  in  the  tone. 

t_7*-J 

[62] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 


"I  was." 

"A  legitimate  son*?" 

Nothing  in  Crozier's  face  showed  what  he  felt, 
except  his  eyes,  and  they  had  a  look  in  them 
which  might  well  have  made  his  questioner  shrink. 
He  turned  calmly  to  the  judge. 

"Your  honor,  does  this  bear  upon  the  case? 
Must  I  answer  this  legal  libertine1?" 

At  the  word  libertine,  the  judge,  the  whole 
court,  and  the  audience  started;  but  it  was  pres- 
ently clear  the  witness  meant  that  the  questioner 
was  abusing  his  legal  privileges,  though  the  peo- 
ple present  interpreted  it  another  way,  and  quite 
rightly. 

The  reply  of  the  judge  was  in  favour  of  the 
lawyer. 

"I  do  not  quite  see  the  full  significance  of  the 
line  of  defence,  but  I  think  I  must  allow  the  ques- 
tion," was  the  judge's  gentle  and  reluctant  reply, 
for  he  was  greatly  impressed  by  this  witness,  by 
his  transparent  honesty  and  straightforward- 
ness. 

"Were  you  a  legitimate  son  of  John  Gathorne 
Crozier  and  his  wife?"  asked  Burlingame. 

"Yes,  a  legitimate  son,"  answered  Crozier  in  an 
even  voice. 

[63] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"Is  John  Gathorne  Crozier  still  living"?" 

"I  said  that  gentleman  was  his  designation  in 
official  documents.  I  supposed  that  would  con- 
vey the  fact  that  he  was  not  living,  but  I  see  you 
do  not  quickly  grasp  a  point." 

Burlingame  was  stung  by  the  laughter  in  the 
court  and  ventured  a  riposte. 

"But  is  once  a  gentleman  always  a  gentleman 
an  infallible  rule?" 

"I  suppose  not;  I  did  not  mean  to  convey  that; 
but  once  a  rogue  always  a  bad  lawyer  holds  good 
in  every  country,"  was  Crozier's  comment  in  a 
low,  quiet  voice  which  stirred,  startled,  and 
amused  the  audience  again. 

"I  must  ask  counsel  to  put  questions  which 
have  some  relevance  even  to  his  own  line  of  de- 
fence," remarked  the  judge  sternly.  "This  is  not 
a  corner  grocery." 

Burlingame  bowed.  He  had  had  a  facer,  but 
he  had  also  shown  the  witness  to  have  been  living 
under  an  assumed  name.  That  was  a  good  start. 
He  hoped  to  add  to  the  discredit.  He  had  ab- 
solutely no  knowledge  of  Crozier's  origin  and 
past;  but  he  was  in  a  position  to  find  it  out  if 
Crozier  told  the  truth  on  oath,  and  he  was  sure 
he  would. 

[64] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 


"Where  was  your  domicile  in  the  old  coun- 
try1?" Burlingame  asked. 

"In  County  Kerry — with  a  flat  in  London." 

"An  estate  in  County  Kerry1?" 

"A  house  and  two  thousand  acres." 

"Is  it  your  property  still*?" 

"It  is  not." 

"You  sold  it?" 

"No." 

"If  you  did  not  sell,  how  is  it  that  you  do  not 
own  it?" 

"It  was  sold  for  me — in  spite  of  me." 

The  judge  smiled,  the  people  smiled,  the  jury 
smiled.  Truly,  though  a  life-history  was  being 
exposed  with  incredible  slowness — "like  pulling 
teeth,"  as  the  Young  Doctor  said — it  was  being 
touched  off  with  laughter. 

"You  were  in  debt?" 

"Quite." 

"How  did  you  get  into  debt?" 

"By  spending  more  than  my  income." 

If  Askatoon  had  been  proud  of  its  legal  talent 
in  the  past  it  had  now  reason  for  revising  its 
opinion.  Burlingame  was  frittering  away  the 
effect  of  his  inquiry  by  elaboration  of  details. 
What  he  gained  by  the  main  startling  fact  he 

[65] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

lost  in  the  details  by  which  the  witness  scored. 
He  asked  another  main  question. 

"Why  did  you  leave  Ireland*?" 

"To  make  money." 

"You  couldn't  do  it  there?" 

"They  were  too  many  for  me  over  there,  so  I 
thought  I'd  come  here,"  slyly  answered  Crozier, 
and  with  a  grave  face;  at  which  the  solemn  scene 
of  a  prisoner  being  tried  for  his  life  was  shaken 
by  a  broad  smiling,  which  in  some  cases  became 
laughter  haughtily  suppressed  by  the  court  at- 
tendant. 

"Have  you  made  money  here?" 

"A  little — with  expectations." 

"What  was  your  income  in  Ireland?" 

"It  began  with  three  thousand  pounds — " 

"Fifteen  thousand  dollars  about?" 

"About  that — about  a  lawyer's  fee  for  one 
whisper  to  a  client  less  than  that.  It  began  with 
that  and  ended  with  nothing." 

"Then  you  escaped?" 

"From  creditors,  lawyers,  and  other  such? 
No,  I  found  you  here." 

The  judge  intervened  again  almost  harshly  on 
the  laughter  of  the  court,  with  the  remark  that  a 
man  was  being  tried  for  his  life;  that  ribaldry 

[66] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 


was  out  of  place,  and  that,  unless  the  course  pur- 
sued by  the  counsel  was  to  discredit  the  reliability 
of  the  character  of  the  witness,  the  examination 
was  in  excess  of  the  privilege  of  counsel. 

"Your  honour  has  rightly  apprehended  what 
my  purpose  is,"  Burlingame  said  deprecatingly. 
He  then  turned  to  Crozier  again,  and  his  voice 
rose  as  it  did  when  he  began  the  examination. 
It  was  as  though  he  was  starting  all  over  again. 

"What  was  it  compelled  (he  was  boldly  ven- 
turing) you  to  leave  Ireland  at  last?  What  was 
the  incident  which  drove  you  out  from  the  land 
where  you  were  born;  from  being  the  owner  of 
two  thousand  acres — " 

"Partly  bog,"  interposed  Crozier. 

" — From  being  the  owner  of  two  thousand 
acres  to  becoming  a  kind  of  head-groom  on  a 
ranch.  What  was  the  cause  of  your  flight?" 

"Flight !  I  came  in  one  of  the  steamers  of  the 
Company  for  which  your  firm  are  the  agents — 
eleven  days  it  took  to  come  from  Glasgow  to 
Quebec." 

Again  the  court  rippled,  again  the  attendant 
intervened  threateningly. 

Burlingame  was  nonplused  this  time,  but  he 
gathered  himself  together. 
[67] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"What  was  the  process  of  law  which  forced 
you  to  leave  your  own  land"?" 

"None  at  all." 

"What  were  your  debts  when  you  left'?" 

"None  at  all." 

"How  much  was  the  last  debt  you  paid1?" 

"Two  thousand  five  hundred  pounds." 

"What  was  its  nature?" 

"It  was  a  debt  of  honour — do  you  under- 
stand?' 

The  subtle  challenge  of  the  voice,  the  sarcasm 
was  not  lost.  Again  there  was  a  struggle  on  the 
part  of  the  audience  not  to  laugh  outright,  and 
so  be  driven  from  the  court  as  had  been  threat- 
ened. 

The  judge  interposed  again  with  the  remark, 
not  very  severe  in  tone,  that  the  witness  was  not 
in  the  box  to  ask  questions,  but  to  answer  them. 
At  the  same  time  he  must  remind  counsel  that 
the  examination  must  discontinue  unless  some- 
thing more  relevant  immediately  appeared  in  the 
evidence. 

There  was  silence  again  for  a  moment,  and 
even  Crozier  himself  seemed  to  steel  himself  for 
a  question  he  felt  was  coming. 

"Are  you  married  or  single4?"   asked  Burlin- 

[68] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 


game,  and  he  did  not  need  to  raise  his  voiv:e  to 
summon  the  interest  of  the  court, 

"I  was  married." 

One  person  in  the  audience  nearly  cried  out. 
It  was  Kitty  Tynan.  She  had  never  allowed  her- 
self to  think  of  that,  but  even  if  she  had,  what 
difference  could  it  make  whether  he  was  married 
or  single,  since  he  was  out  of  her  star*? 

"Are  you  not  married  now1?" 

"I  do  not  know." 

"You  mean  you  do  not  know  if  you  have  been 
divorced?" 

"No." 

"You  mean  your  wife  is  dead*?" 

"No." 

"What  do  you  mean1?  That  you  do  not  know 
whether  your  wife  is  living  or  dead*?" 

"Quite  so." 

"Have  you  heard  from  her  since  you  saw  her 
last?" 

"I  had  one  letter." 

Kitty  Tynan  thought  of  the  unopened  letter  in 
a  woman's  handwriting  in  the  green-baize  desk 
in  her  mother's  house. 

"No  more?" 

"No  more." 

[69] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"Are  we  to  understand  that  you  do  not  know 
whether  your  wife  is  living  or  dead*?" 

"I  have  no  information  that  she  is  dead." 

"Why  did  you  leave  her'?" 

"I  have  not  said  that  I  left  her.  Primarily  I 
left  Ireland." 

"Assuming  that  she  is  alive,  your  wife  will  not 
live  with  you?" 

"Ah,  what  information  have  you  to  that 
effect?" 

The  judge  informed  Crozier  that  he  must  not 
ask  questions  of  counsel. 

"Why  is  she  not  with  you  here?" 

"As  you  said,  I  am  only  picking  up  a  living 
here,  and  even  the  passage  by  your  own  second- 
class  steamship  line  is  expensive." 

The  judge  suppressed  a  smile.  He  greatly 
liked  the  witness. 

"Do  you  deny  that  you  parted  from  your  wife 
in  anger?" 

"When  I  am  asked  that  question  I  will  try  to 
answer  it.  Meanwhile  I  do  not  deny  what  has 
not  been  put  before  me  in  the  usual  way." 

Here  the  judge  sternly  rebuked  the  counsel, 
who  ventured  upon  one  last  question. 

"Have  you  any  children?" 
[70] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 


"None." 

"Has  your  brother,  who  inherited,  any  chil- 
dren"?" 

"None  that  I  know  of." 

"Are  you  the  heir-presumptive  to  the  bar- 
onetcy?" 

"I  am." 

"Yet  your  wife  will  not  live  with  you1?" 

"Call  Mrs.  Crozier  as  a  witness  and  see. 
Meanwhile  I  am  not  upon  my  trial." 

He  turned  to  the  judge,  who  promptly  called 
upon  Burlingame  to  conclude  his  examination. 

Burlingame  asked  two  questions  more.  "Why 
did  you  change  your  name  when  you  came  here*?" 

"I  wanted  to  obliterate  myself." 

"I  put  it  to  you,  that  what  you  want  is  to  avoid 
the  outraged  law  of  your  own  country." 

"No — I  want  to  avoid  the  outrageous  lawyers 
of  yours." 

Again  there  was  a  pause  in  the  proceedings,  and 
on  a  protest  from  the  crown  attorney  the  judge 
put  an  end  to  the  cross-examination  with  the 
solemn  reminder  to  a  hushed  assembly  that  a  man 
was  being  tried  for  his  life,  and  that  the  present 
proceedings  were  a  lamentable  reflection  on  the 
levity  of  human  nature — at  least  of  human  na- 
[71] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

ture  in  Askatoon.  Turning  with  friendly 
scrutiny  to  Crozier,  he  said: 

"In  the  early  stage  of  his  examination  the  wit- 
ness informed  the  court  that  he  had  made  a  heavy 
loss  through  a  debt  of  honour  immediately  before 
leaving  England.  Will  he  say  in  what  way  he 
incurred  the  obligation1?  Are  we  to  assume  that 
it  was  through  gambling — card-playing,  or  other 
games  of  chance*?" 

"Through  backing  the  wrong  horse,"  was 
Crozier's  instant  reply. 

"That  phrase  is  often  applied  to  mining  or 
other  unreal  flights  for  fortune,"  said  the  judge 
with  a  dry  smile. 

"This  was  a  real  horse  on  a  real  flight  to  the 
winning-post,"  added  Crozier  with  a  quirk  at  the 
corner  of  his  mouth. 

"Honest  contest  with  man  or  horse  is  no  crime, 
but  it  is  tragedy  to  stake  all  on  the  contest  and 
lose,"  was  the  judge's  grave  and  pedagogic  com- 
ment. "We  shall  now  hear  from  the  counsel  for 
defence  his  reason  for  conducting  his  cross-ex- 
amination on  such  unusual  lines.  Latitude  of 
this  kind  is  only  permissible  if  it  opens  up  any 
weakness  in  the  case  against  the  prisoner." 

The  judge  thus  did  Burlingame  a  good  turn 
[72] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 


as  well  as  Crozier,  by  creating  an  atmosphere 
of  gravity,  even  of  tragedy,  in  which  Burlingame 
could  make  his  speech  in  defence  of  the  prisoner. 
Burlingame  started  hesitatingly,  got  into  his 
stride,  assembled  the  points  of  his  defence  with 
the  skill  of  which  he  really  was  capable,  when  he 
was  not  under  the  influence  of  morphia,  in  which 
he  occasionally  indulged  as  a  kind  of  antidote 
to  less  occasional  bouts  of  drink.  He  made  a 
strong  appeal  for  acquittal,  but  if  not  complete 
acquittal,  then  manslaughter.  He  showed  that 
the  only  real  evidence  which  could  convict  his 
man  of  murder  was  that  of  the  witness  Crozier. 
If  he  had  been  content  to  discredit  evidence  of  the 
witness  by  an  adroit  but  guarded  misuse  of  the 
facts  he  had  brought  out  regarding  Crozier's  past ; 
to  emphasize  the  fact  that  he  was  living  under  an 
assumed  name  and  that  his  bona  fides  was  doubt- 
ful, he  might  have  impressed  the  jury  to  some 
slight  degree.  He  could  not,  however,  control 
the  malice  he  felt,  and  he  was  smarting  from 
Crozier's  retorts.  He  had  a  vanity  easily 
lacerated,  and  he  was  now  too  savage  to  abate  the 
ferocity  of  his  forensic  attack.  He  sat  down, 
however,  with  a  sure  sense  of  failure.  Every 
orator  knows  when  he  is  beating  the  air,  even 
[73] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

when   his   audience   is   quiet  and  apparently   at- 
tentive. 

The  crown  attorney  was  a  man  of  the  serenest 
method  and  of  cold,  unforensic  logic.  He  had 
a  deadly  precision  of  speech,  a  very  remarkable 
memory,  and  a  great  power  of  organising  and  as- 
sembling his  facts.  There  was  little  left  of  Bur- 
lingame's  appeal  when  he  sat  down.  He  de- 
clared that  to  discredit  Crozier's  evidence  because 
he  chose  to  use  another  name  than  his  own,  be- 
cause he  was  parted  from  his  wife,  because  he 
left  England  practically  penniless  to  earn  an 
honest  living — no  one  had  shown  it  was  not — was 
the  last  resort  of  legal  desperation.  It  was  an 
indefensible  thing  to  endeavour  to  create  prej- 
udice against  a  man  because  of  his  own  evidence 
given  with  great  frankness.  Not  one  single  word 
of  evidence  had  the  defence  brought  to  discredit 
Crozier,  save  by  Crozier's  own  word  of  mouth, 
and  if  Crozier  had  cared  to  commit  perjury  the 
defence  could  not  have  proved  him  guilty  of  it. 
Even  if  Crozier  had  not  told  the  truth  as  it  was, 
counsel  for  the  defence  were  incapable  of  con- 
victing him  of  falsehood.  But  even  if  Crozier 
was  a  perjurer,  justice  demanded  that  his  evi- 
dence should  be  weighed  as  truth  from  its  own 
[74] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 

inherent  probability  and  supported  by  surround- 
ing facts.  In  a  long  experience  he  had  never 
seen  animus  against  a  witness  so  recklessly  ex- 
hibited as  by  counsel  in  this  case. 

The  judge  was  not  quite  so  severe  in  his  sum- 
ming up,  but  he  did  say  of  Crozier  that  his  direct 
replies  to  Burlingame's  questions,  intended  to 
prejudice  him  in  the  eyes  of  the  community  into 
which  he  had  come  a  stranger,  bore  undoubted 
evidence  of  truth;  for  if  he  had  chosen  to  say 
what  might  have  saved  him  from  the  suspicions,, 
ill  or  well  founded  of  his  present  fellow  citizens, 
he  might  have  done  so  with  impunity,  save  for 
the  reproach  of  his  own  conscience.  On  the 
whole  the  judge  summed  up  powerfully  against 
the  prisoner  Logan,  with  the  result  that  the  jury 
were  not  out  for  more  than  a  half-hour.  Their 
verdict  was  guilty  of  murder. 

In  the  scene  which  followed,  Crozier  dropped 
his  head  into  his  hand  and  sat  immovable  and 
overcome  as  the  judge  put  on  the  black  cap  and 
delivered  sentence.  When  the  prisoner  left  the 
dock,  and  the  crowd  began  to  disperse,  satisfied 
that  justice  had  been  done — save  in  that  small 
circle  where  the  Macmahons  were  supreme — Cro- 
zier rose  with  other  witnesses  to  leave.  As  he 
[75] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

looked  ahead  of  him  the  first  face  he  saw  was  that 
of  Kitty  Tynan,  and  something  in  it  startled 
him.  Where  had  he  seen  that  look  before? 
Yes,  he  remembered.  It  was  when  he  was 
twenty-one  and  had  been  sent  away  to  Algiers 
because  he  was  falling  in  love  with  a  farmer's 
daughter.  As  he  drove  down  a  lane  with  his 
father  towards  the  railway  station,  those  long 
years  ago,  he  had  seen  the  girl's  face  looking  at 
him  from  the  window  of  a  labourer's  cottage  at 
the  crossroads;  and  its  stupified  pain  and  disap- 
pointment haunted  him  for  many  years,  even 
after  the  girl  had  married  and  gone  to  live  in 
Scotland — that  place  of  torment  for  an  Irish  per- 
son. 

The  look  in  Kitty  Tynan's  face  reminded  him 
of  that  farmer's  lass  in  his  boyhood's  history. 
He  was  to  blame  then — was  he  to  blame  now4? 
Certainly  not  consciously,  certainly  not  by  any  in- 
tended word  or  act.  Now  he  met  her  eyes  and 
smiled  at  her,  not  gaily,  not  gravely,  but  with  a 
kind  of  whimsical  helplessness;  for  she  was  the 
first  to  remind  him  that  he  was  leaving;  the  court- 

O 

room  in  a  different  position  (if  not  a  different 
man)  from  that  in  which  he  entered  it.  He  had 
-.entered  the  court-room  as  James  Gathorne 

[76] 


THE      LOGAN      TRIAL 

Kerry,  and  he  was  leaving  it  as  Shiel  Crozier; 
and  somehow  James  Gathorne  Kerry  had  always 
been  to  himself  a  different  man  from  Shiel  Cro- 
zier, with  different  views,  different  feelings,  if 
not  different  characteristics. 

He  saw  faces  turned  to  him,  a  few  with  intense 
curiosity,  fewer  still  with  a  little  furtiveness, 
some  with  amusement,  and  many  with  unmistak- 
able approval;  for  one  thing  was  clear,  if  his 
own  evidence  was  correct:  he  was  the  son  of  a 
baronet,  he  was  heir-presumptive  to  a  baronetcy, 
and  he  had  scored  off  Augustus  Burlingame  in  a 
way  which  delighted  a  naturally  humorous  peo- 
ple. He  noted,  however,  that  the  nod  which 
Studd  Bradley,  the  financier,  gave  him  had  in  it 
an  enigmatic  something  which  puzzled  him. 
Surely  Bradley  could  not  be  prejudiced  against 
him  because  of  the  evidence  he  had  given. 
There  was  nothing  criminal  in  living  under  an  as- 
sumed name,  which,  anyhow,  was  his  own  name 
in  three-fourths  of  it,  and  in  the  other  part  was 
the  name  of  the  county  where  he  was  born. 

"Divils  me  own,  I  told  you  he  was  up  among 

the  dukes,"  said  Malachi  Deely  to  John  Sibley  as 

they  came  out.     "And  he's  from  me  own  county, 

and  I  know  the  name  well  enough;  an'  a  damn 

[77] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

good  name  it  is.  The  bulls  of  Castlegarry  was 
famous  in  the  south  of  Ireland." 

"I've  a  warm  spot  for  him.  I  was  right,  you 
see.  Backing  horses  ruined  him,"  said  Sibley  in 
reply;  and  he  looked  at  Crozier  admiringly. 

There  is  the  communion  of  saints,  but  nearer 
and  dearer  is  the  communion  of  sinners;  for  a 
common  danger  is  their  bond,  and  that  is  even 
more  than  a  common  hope. 


[78] 


CHAPTER  IV 

STRENGTH    SHALL   BE 
GIVEN    THEE" 


ON  the  evening  of  the  day  of  the  trial,  Mrs. 
Tynan,  having  fixed  the  new  blind  to  the 
window  of  Shiel  Crozier's  room,  which  was  on 
the  ground-floor  front,  was  lowering  and  raising 
it  to  see  if  it  worked  properly,  when  out  in  the 
moonlit  street  she  saw  a  wagon  approaching  her 
house  surrounded  and  followed  by  obviously  ex- 
cited men.  Once  before  she  had  seen  just  such 
a  group  nearing  her  door.  That  was  when  her 
husband  was  brought  home  to  die  in  her  arms. 
She  had  a  sudden  conviction,  as,  holding  the 
blind  in  her  hand,  she  looked  out  into  the  night, 
that  again  tragedy  was  to  cross  her  threshold. 
Standing  for  an  instant  under  the  fascination  of 
terror,  she  recovered  herself  with  a  shiver,  and, 
stepping  down  from  the  chair  where  she  had  been 

[79] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

fixing  the  blind,  with  the  instinct  of  real  woman, 
she  ran  to  the  bed  of  the  room  where  she  was, 
and  made  it  ready.  Why  did  she  feel  that  it 
was  Shiel  Crozier's  bed  which  should  be  made 
ready?  Or  did  she  not  feel  it?  Was  it  only  a 
dazed,  automatic  act,  not  connected  with  the  per- 
son who  was  to  lie  in  the  bed?  Was  she  then  a 
fatalist?  Were  trouble  and  sorrow  so  much  her 
portion  that  to  her  mind  this  tragedy,  whatever  it 
was,  must  touch  the  man  nearest  to  her — and  cer- 
tainly Shiel  Crozier  was  far  nearer  than  Jesse 
Bulrush.  Quite  apart  from  wealth  or  position, 
personality  plays  a  part  more  powerful  than  all 
else  in  the  eyes  of  every  woman  who  has  a  soul 
which  has  substance  enough  to  exist  at  all.  Such 
men  as  Crozier  have  compensations  for  "whate'er 
they  lack."  It  never  occurred  to  Mrs.  Tynan  to 
go  to  Jesse  Bulrush's  room  or  the  room  of  middle- 
aged,  comely  Nurse  Egan.  She  did  the  instinc- 
tive thing,  as  did  the  woman  who  sent  a  man  a 
rope  as  a  gift,  on  the  ground  that  the  fortune  in 
his  hand  said  that  he  was  born  not  to  be  drowned. 
Mrs.  Tynan's  instinct  was  right.  By  the 
time  she  had  flashed  the  bed  into  shape,  got  a 
bowl  of  water  ready,  lighted  a  lamp,  and  drawn 
the  bed  out  from  the  wall,  there  was  a  knocking 
[80] 


STRENGTH      SHALL      BE      GIVEN 

at  the  door.  In  a  moment  she  had  opened  it, 
and  was  faced  by  John  Sibley,  whose  hat  was  off 
as  though  he  were  in  the  presence  of  death.  This 
gave  her  a  shock,  and  her  eyes  strove  painfully  to 
see  the  figure  which  was  being  borne  feet  fore- 
most over  her  threshold. 

"It's  Mr.  Crazier?"  she  asked. 

"He  was  shot  coming  home  here — by  the  Mac- 
mahon  mob,  I  guess,"  returned  Sibley  huskily. 

"Is — is  he  dead1?"  she  asked  tremblingly. 

"No.     Hurt  bad." 

"The  kindest  man — it'd  break  Kitty's  heart — 
and  mine,"  she  added  hastily,  for  she  might  be 
misunderstood;  and  John  Sibley  had  shown  un- 
mistakable signs  of  interest  in  her  daughter. 

"Where's  the  Young  Doctor'?"  she  asked, 
catching  sight  of  Crozier's  face  as  they  laid  him 
on  the  bed. 

"He's  done  the  first  aid,  and  he's  off  getting 
what's  needed  for  the  operation.  He'll  be  here 
in  a  minute  or  so,"  said  a  banker  who,  a  few 
days  before,  had  refused  Crozier  credit. 

"Gently,  gently — don't  do  it  that  way,"  said 
Mrs.  Tynan  in  sharp  reproof  as  they  began  to 
take  off  Crozier's  clothes. 

"Are  you  going  to  stay  while  we  do  it4?"  asked 
[81] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

a  maker  of  mineral  waters,  who  whined  at  the 
prayer  meetings  of  a  soul  saved  and  roared  at  his 
employees  like  a  soul  damned. 

"Oh,  don't  be  a  fool !"  was  the  impatient  reply. 
"I've  a  grown-up  girl  and  I've  had  a  husband. 
Don't  pull  at  his  vest  like  that.  Go  away.  You 
don't  know  how.  I've  had  experience — my  hus- 
band .  .  .  There,  wait  till  I  cut  it  away  with 
the  scissors.  Cover  him  with  the  quilt.  Now, 
then,  catch  hold  of  his  trousers  under  the  quilt, 
and  draw  them  off  slowly.  There,  lift  him — 
now  slowly  off.  There  you  are — and  nothing  to 
shock  the  modesty  of  a  grown-up  woman  or  any 
other  when  a  life's  at  stake.  What  does  the 
Young  Doctor  say1?" 

"Hush!  He's  coming  to,"  interposed  the 
banker. 

It  was  as  though  the  quiet  that  followed  the 
removal  of  his  clothes  and  the  touch  of  Mrs. 
Tynan's  hand  on  his  head  had  called  Crozier  back 
from  unconsciousness. 

The  first  face  he  saw  was  that  of  the  banker. 
In  spite  of  the  loss  of  blood  and  his  pitiable  con- 
dition, a  whimsical  expression  came  to  his  eyes. 
"Lucky  for  you  you  didn't  lend  me  the  money," 
[82] 


STRENGTH      SHALL      BE      GIVEN 

he  said  with  a  voice  which  had  but  a  shadow  of 
its  old  fulness. 

The  banker  shook  his  head.  "I'm  not  think- 
ing of  that,  Mr.  Crozier,"  he  said.  "God  knows, 
I'm  not!" 

Crozier  caught  sight  of  Mrs.  Tynan.  "It's 
hard  on  you  to  have  me  brought  here,"  he  mur- 
mured as  she  took  his  hand. 

"Not  so  hard  as  if  they  hadn't,"  she  replied. 
"That's  what  a  home's  for — not  just  a  place  for 
eating  and  drinking  and  sleeping." 

"It  wasn't  part  of  the  bargain,"  he  said 
weakly. 

"It  was  my  part  of  the  bargain,"  she  responded. 

"Here's  Kitty,"  said  the  maker  of  mineral 
waters,  as  there  was  the  swish  of  a  skirt  at  the 
door. 

"Who  are  you  calling  'Kitty'1?"  asked  the  girl 
herself  indignantly,  as  they  motioned  her  back 
from  the  bedside.  "There's  too  many  people 
here,"  she  added  abruptly  to  her  mother.  "We 
can  take  care  of  him" — she  jerked  her  head  to- 
wards the  bed.  "We  don't  want  any  help  ex- 
cept— except  from  John  Sibley  here,  if  he  will 
stay,  and  you,  too,"  she  added  to  the  banker. 
[83] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

She  had  not  yet  looked  at  the  figure  on  the 
bed.  She  felt  she  could  not  do  so  while  all  these 
people  were  in  the  room.  She  needed  time  to 
adjust  herself  to  the  situation.  It  was  as  though 
she  was  the  authority  in  the  household  and  took 
control  even  of  her  mother.  Mrs.  Tynan  under- 
stood. She  had  a  great  belief  in  her  daughter 
and  admired  her  cleverness,  and  she  was  always 
ready  to  be  ruled  by  her;  it  was  like  being 
"bossed"  by  the  man  she  had  lost.  Besides,  she 
had  a  true  instinct  concerning  Kitty's  feelings  at 
this  moment,  and  she  wished  to  humour  her. 

"Yes,  you'd  all  better  go,"  Mrs.  Tynan  said. 
"He  wants  all  the  air  he  can  get,  and  I  can't 
make  things  ready  with  you  all  in  the  room.  Go 
outdoors  for  a  while,  anyway.  It's  summer  and 
you'll  not  take  cold!  The  Young  Doctor  has 
work  to  do,  and  my  girl  and  I  and  these  two  will 
help  him  plenty" — she  motioned  to  the  banker 
and  the  gambling  farmer. 

In  a  moment  the  room  was  cleared  of  all  save 
the  four  and  Crozier,  who  knew  that  upon  the 
coming  operation  depended  his  life.  He  had 
been  conscious  when  the  Young  Doctor  said  this 
was  so,  and  he  was  thinking,  as  he  lay  there  watch- 
ing these  two  women  out  of  his  nearly  closed 
[84] 


STRENGTH      SHALL      BE      GIVEN 

eyes,  that  he  would  like  to  be  back  in  County 
Kerry  at  Castlegarry  with  the  girl  he  had  mar- 
ried and  had  left  without  a  good-bye  near  five 
years  gone.  If  he  had  to  die  he  would  like  to 
die  at  home ;  and  that  could  not  be. 

Kitty  had  the  courage  to  turn  towards  him 
now.  As  she  caught  sight  of  his  face  for  the  first 
time — she  had  so  far  kept  her  head  turned 
away — she  became  very  pale.  Then,  suddenly, 
she  gathered  herself  together  with  a  courage 
worthy  of  the  most  primitive  savage  or  the  high- 
est aristocrat — like  those  who  went  to  the  guillo- 
tine at  the  word  of  Danton.  Going  over  to  the 
bed  she  took  the  limp  hand  lying  on  the  coverlet. 

"Cheer  up,  soldier,"  she  said  in  the  colloquial- 
ism her  father  often  used,  and  she  smiled  at  Cro- 
zier  a  great-hearted,  helpful  smile. 

"You  are  a  brick  of  bricks,  Kitty  Tynan,"  he 
whispered,  and  smiled. 

"Here  comes  the  Young  Doctor,"  said  Mrs. 
Tynan  as  the  door  opened  unceremoniously. 

"Well,  I  have  to  take  an  excursion,"  Crozier 
said,  "and  I  mayn't  come  back.  If  I  don't,  au 
revoir,  Kitty." 

"You  are  coming  back,  all  right,"  she  answered 
firmly.  "It'll  take  more  than  a  horse-thief's  bul- 

[85] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

let  to  kill  you.  You've  got  to  come  back. 
You're  as  tough  as  nails.  And  I'll  hold  your 
hand  all  through  it — yes,  I  will!"  she  added  to 
the  Young  Doctor,  who  had  patted  her  shoulder 
and  told  her  to  go  to  another  room. 

"I'm  going  to  help  you,  doctor-man,  if  you 
please,"  she  said,  as  he  turned  to  the  box  of  in- 
struments which  his  assistant  held. 

"There's  another — one  of  my  colleagues — com- 
ing, I  hope,"  the  Young  Doctor  replied. 

"That's  all  right,  but  I  am  staying  to  see  Mr. 
Crozier  through.  I  said  I'd  hold  his  hand,  and 
I'm  going  to  do  it,"  she  added  firmly. 

"Very  well;  put  on  a  big  apron,  and  see  that 
you  go  through  with  us  if  you  start.  No  non- 
sense." 

"There'll  be  no  nonsense  from  me,"  she  an- 
swered quietly. 

"I  want  the  bed  in  the  middle  of  the  room," 
the  Young  Doctor  said,  and  the  others  gently 
moved  it. 


[86] 


CHAPTER  V 
A    STORY    TO    BE   TOLD 

A  GREAT  surgeon  said  a  few  years  ago  that 
he  was  never  nervous  when  performing  an 
operation,  though  there  was  sometimes  a  mo- 
ment when  every  resource  of  character,  skill,  and 
brain  came  into  play.  That  was  when,  having 
diagnosed  correctly  and  operated,  a  new  and  un- 
expected seat  of  trouble  and  peril  was  exposed, 
and  instant  action  had  to  be  taken.  The  great 
man  naturally  rose  to  the  situation  and  dealt 
with  it  coolly  and  implacably;  but  he  paid  the 
price  afterwards  in  his  sleep  when,  night  after 
night,  he  performed  the  operation  over  and  over 
again  with  the  same  strain  on  his  subconscious 
self. 

So  it  was  with  Kitty  Tynan  in  her  small  way. 
She  had  insisted  on  being  allowed  to  help  at  the 
operation,   and  the  Young  Doctor,  who  had  a 
[87] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

good  knowledge  of  life  and  knew  the  stuff  in  her, 
consented;  and  so  far  as  the  operation  was  con- 
cerned she  justified  his  faith  in  her.  When  the 
banker  had  to  leave  the  room  at  the  sight  of  the 
carnage,  she  remained,  and  she  and  John  Sibtey 
were  as  cool  as  the  Young  Doctor  and  his  fellow- 
anatomist,  till  it  was  all  over,  and  Shiel  Crozier 
was  started  again  on  a  safe  journey  back  to 
health.  Then  a  thing,  which  would  have  been 
amusing  if  it  had  not  been  so  deeply  human,  hap- 
pened. She  and  John  Sibley  went  out  of  the 
house  together  into  the  moonlit  night,  and  the 
reaction  seized  them  both  at  the  same  moment. 
She  gave  a  gulp  and  burst  into  tears,  and  he, 
though  as  tall  as  Crozier,  also  broke  down,  and 
they  sat  on  the  stump  of  a  tree  together,  her  hand 
in  his,  and  cried  like  two  children. 

"Never  since  I  was  a  little  runt — did  I — never 
cried  in  thirty  years — and  here  I  am — leaking 
like  a  pail!" 

Thus  spoke  John  Sibley  in  gasps  and  squeez- 
ing Kitty's  hand  all  the  time  unconsciously,  but 
spontaneously,  and  as  part  of  what  he  felt.  He 
would  not,  however,  have  dared  to  hold  her  hand 
on  any  other  occasion,  while  always  wanting  to 
hold  it,  and  wanting  her  also  to  share  his  varied 
[88] 


A      STORY      TO      BE      TOLD 

and  not  wholly  reputed,  though  far  from  pre- 
carious, existence.  He  had  never  got  so  far  as 
to  tell  her  that;  but  if  she  had  sense  and  under- 
standing she  would  realise  after  to-night  what 
he  had  in  his  mind. 

She,  feeling  her  arm  thrill  with  the  magnetism 
of  his  very  vital  palm,  had  her  turn  at  explana- 
tion of  the  weakness.  "I  wouldn't  have  broke 
down  myself — it  was  all  your  fault,"  she  said.  "I 
saw  it — yes — in  your  face  as  we  left  the  house. 
I'm  so  glad  it's  over  safe — no  one  belonging  to 
him  here,  and  not  knowing  if  he'd  wake  up  alive 
or  not — I  just  was  swamped!" 

He  took  up  the  misty  excuse  and  explanation. 
"I  had  a  feeling  for  him  from  the  start;  and 
then  that  Logan  Trial  to-day,  and  the  way  he 
talked  out  straight,  and  told  the  truth  to  shame 
the  devil — it's  what  does  a  man  good !  And  go- 
ing bung  over  a  horserace — that's  what  got  me, 
too,  where  I  was  young  and  tender.  Swatted 
that  Burlingame  every  time — one  eye,  two  eyes 
all  black,  teeth  out,  nose  flattened — called  him  an 
'outrageous  lawyer' — my,  that  last  clip  was  a 
good  one!  You  bet  he's  a  sport — Crozier!" 

Kitty  nodded  eagerly  while  still  wiping  her 
red  eyes.  "He  made  the  judge  smile — I  saw  it, 
[89] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

not  ten  minutes  before  his  honour  put  on  the  black 
cap.  You  couldn't  have  believed  it,  if  you 
hadn't  seen  it —  Here,  let  go  my  hand,"  she 
added,  suddenly  conscious  of  the  enormity  John 
Sibley  was  committing  by  squeezing  it  recklessly 
now. 

It  is  perfectly  true  that  she  did  not  quite 
realise  that  he  had  taken  her  hand — that  he  had 
taken  her  hand.  She  was  conscious  in  a  nice, 
sympathetic  way  that  her  hand  had  been  taken,  but 
it  was  lost  in  the  abstraction  of  her  emotion. 
She  only  realised  how  far  she  had  committed  her- 
self when  his  demonstrations  became  so  fervid 
that  her  mind  must  recognise  as  well  as  her  senses. 

"Oh,  here,  let  it  go  quick!"  she  added — "and 
not  because  mother's  coming,  either,"  she  added 
as  the  door  opened  and  her  mother  came  out — not 
to  spy,  not  to  reproach  her  daughter  for  sitting 
with  a  man  in  the  moonlight  at  ten  o'clock  at 
night,  but — good,  practical  soul— to  bring  them 
each  a  cup  of  beef-tea. 

"Here,  you  two,"  she  said  as  she  hurried  to 
them.  "You  need  something  after  that  business 
in  there,  and  there  isn't  time  to  get  supper  ready. 
It's  as  good  for  you  as  supper,  anyway.  It's 
made  of  the  best  beef  this  side  of  the  sea.  I 
[90] 


A      STORY     TO      BE      TOLD 


don't  believe  in  underfeeding.  Nothing's  too 
good  to  swallow." 

She  watched  them  sip  the  tea  slowly  like  two 
school-children. 

"And  when  you've  drunk  it  you  must  go  right 
to  bed,  Kitty,"  she  added  presently.  "You've 
had  your  own  way,  and  you  saw  the  thing 
through;  but  there's  always  a  reaction,  and  you'll 
pay  for  it.  It  wasn't  fit  work  for  a  girl  of  your 
age;  but  I'm  proud  of  your  nerve,  and  I'm  glad 
you  showed  those  doctors  what  you  can  do. 
You've  got  your  father's  brains  and  my  grit,"  she 
added  with  a  sigh  of  satisfaction.  "Come 
along — bed  now,  Kitty.  If  you  get  too  tired 
you'll  have  bad  dreams." 

Perhaps  she  was  too  tired.  In  any  case  she 
had  dreams.  Just  as  the  great  surgeon  per- 
formed his  operation  over  and  over  in  his  sleep, 
so  Kitty  Tynan,  through  long  hours  that  night, 
and  for  many  nights  afterwards,  saw  the  swift 
knives,  helped  to  staunch  the  blood,  held  the 
basin,  disinfected  the  instruments  which  had  made 
an  attack  on  the  man  of  men  in  her  eyes, 
and  saw  the  wound  stitched  up — the  last  act  of 
the  business  before  the  Young  Doctor  turned  to 
[91] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

her  and  said,  "You'll  do  wherever  you're  put  in 
life,  Miss  Kitty  Tynan.  You're  a  great  girl — 
and  now  run  away  and  get  some  fresh  air  and  for- 
get all  about  it." 

Forget  all  about  it!  So  the  Young  Doctor 
knew  what  happened  after  a  terrific  experience 
like  that!  In  truth,  he  knew  only  too  well. 
Great  surgeons  do  surgery  only  and  have  in- 
numerable operations  to  give  them  skill;  but  a 
country  physician  and  surgeon  must  be  a  sane  be- 
ing to  keep  his  nerve  when  called  on  to  use  the 
knife,  and  he  must  have  a  more  than  usual  gift 
for  such  business.  That  is  what  the  Young  Doc- 
tor had;  but  he  knew  that  it  was  not  easy  to  for- 
get those  scenes  in  which  man  carved  the  body  of 
fellow  man,  laying  bare  the  very  vitals  of  exist- 
ence, seeing  "the  wheels  go  round." 

It  haunted  Kitty  Tynan  in  the  nighttime,  and 
perhaps  it  was  that  which  toned  down  a  little 
the  colour  of  her  face — the  kind  of  difference  of 
colouring  there  is  between  natural  gold  and 
14-carat.  But  in  the  daytime  she  was  quite 
happy,  and  though  there  was  haunting,  it  was 
Shiel  Crozier  who,  first  helpless,  then  convales- 
cent, was  haunted  by  her  presence.  It  gave  him 
pleasure,  but  it  was  a  pleasure  which  brought 
[92] 


A      STORY     TO      BE     TOLD 


pain.  He  was  not  so  blind  that  he  had  not 
caught  at  her  romance  in  which  he  was  the  cen- 
tral figure — a  romance  which  had  not  vanished 
since  the  day  he  declared  in  the  court-room  that 
he  was  married — or  had  been  married.  Kitty's 
eyes  told  their  own  story,  and  it  made  him  very 
uneasy  and  remorseful.  Yet  he  could  not  re- 
member when,  even  for  an  instant,  he  had  played 
with  her.  She  had  always  seemed  part  of  a  sim- 
ple family  life  for  which  he  and  Jesse  Bulrush 
and  her  mother  and  the  nurse — Nurse  Egan — 
were  responsible.  What  a  blessing  Nurse  Egan 
had  been !  Otherwise  all  the  nursing  would  have 
been  performed  by  Kitty  and  her  mother,  and  it 
might  well  have  broken  them  down,  for  they  were 
well  determined  to  nurse  him  themselves. 

When,  however,  Nurse  Egan  came  back  two 
days  after  the  operation  was  performed  they  in- 
cluded her  in  the  responsibility,  as  one  of  the 
family ;  and  as  she  had  no  other  important  case  on 
at  the  time,  fortunately  she  could  give  Crozier 
her  almost  undivided  attention.  She  had  been 
at  first  disposed  to  keep  Kitty  out  of  the  sick- 
chamber,  as  no  place  for  a  girl,  but  she  soon  aban- 
doned that  position,  for  Kitty  was  not  the  girl 
ever  to  think  of  impropriety.  Rather  primitive 

[93] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

and  of  a  before-the-flood  nature  she  was,  but  she 
had  not  the  faintest  vulgar  strain  in  her.  Her 
mind  was  essentially  pure,  and  nothing  material 
in  her  had  been  awakened. 

Her  greatest  joy  was  to  do  the  many  things  for 
the  patient  which  a  nurse  must  do — prepare  his 
food,  give  him  drink,  adjust  his  pillows,  bathe  his 
face  and  hands,  take  his  temperature;  and  on  his 
part  he  tried  hard  to  disguise  from  her  the  appre- 
hension he  felt,  and  to  avoid  any  hint  by  word 
or  look  that  he  saw  anything  save  the  actions  of  a 
kind  heart.  True,  her  views  as  to  what  was 
proper  and  what  was  improper  might  possibly  be 
on  a  different  plane  from  his  own.  For  in- 
stance, he  had  seen  girls  of  her  station  in  the  West 
kiss  young  men  freely — men  whom  they  never 
expected  to  marry  and  had  no  thought  of  marry- 
ing; and  that  was  not  the  custom  of  his  own  class 
in  his  home-country. 

As  he  got  well  slowly,  and  life  opened  out  be- 
fore him  again,  he  felt  that  he  had  to  pursue  a 
new  course,  and  in  that  course  he  must  take  ac- 
count of  Kitty  Tynan,  though  he  could  not  de- 
cide how.  He  had  a  deep  confidence  in  the 
Young  Doctor,  in  his  judgment  and  in  his  char- 
acter; and  it  was  almost  inevitable  that  he  should 

[94,] 


A      STORY      TO      BE      TOLD 

tell  his  life-story  to  the  man  whose  skill  had 
saved  him  from  death  in  a  strange  land,  with  all 
undone  he  wanted  to  do  ere  he  returned  to  a  land 
which  was  not  strange. 

The  thing  happened,  as  such  things  do  happen, 
in  a  quite  natural  way  one  day  when  he  and  the 
Young  Doctor  were  discussing  the  probable  ver- 
dict against  the  man  who  had  shot  him — the  trial 
was  to  come  on  soon,  and  once  again  Augustus 
Burlingame  was  to  be  counsel  for  the  defence; 
and  once  again  Crozier  would  have  to  appear  in 
a  witness-box. 

"I  think  you  ought  to  know,  Crozier,  that,  in 
view  of  the  trial,  Burlingame  has  written  to  a 
firm  of  lawyers  in  Kerry  to  secure  full  infor- 
mation about  your  past,"  the  Young  Doctor 
said. 

Crozier  gave  one  of  those  little  jerks  of  the 
head  characteristic  of  him  and  said,  "Why,  of 
course,  I  knew  he  would  do  that  after  I  gave  my 
evidence  in  the  Logan  Trial."  He  raised  him- 
self on  his  elbow.  "I  owe  you  a  great  deal," 
he  added  feelingly,  "and  I  can't  repay  you  in 
cash  or  kindness  for  what  you  have  done;  but  it 
is  due  you  to  tell  you  my  whole  story,  and  that  is 
what  I  propose  to  do  now." 
[95] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

"If  you  think—" 

"I  do  think;  and  also  I  want  both  Mrs.  Tynan 
and  her  daughter  to  hear  my  story.  Better,  truer 
friends  a  man  could  not  have;  and  I  want  them 
to  know  the  worst  there  is  and  the  best  there  is,  if 
there  is  any  best.  They  and  you  have  trusted 
me,  been  too  good  to  me,  and  what  I  said  at  the 
trial  is  not  enough.  I  want  to  do  what  I've  never 
done — tell  everything.  It  will  do  me  good; 
and  perhaps  as  I  tell  it  I'll  see  myself  and  every- 
thing else  in  a  truer  light  than  I've  yet  seen  it 
all." 

"You  are  sure  you  want  Mrs.  Tynan  and  her 
daughter  to  hear?" 

"Absolutely  sure." 

"They  are  not  in  your  rank  in  life,  you  know." 

"They  are  my  friends,  and  I  owe  them  more 
than  I  can  say.  There  is  nothing  they  cannot  or 
should  not  hear.  I  can  say  that  at  least." 

"Shall  I  ask  them  to  come?" 

"Yes.  Give  me  a  swig  of  water  first.  It 
won't  be  easy,  but — " 

He  held  out  his  hand  and  the  Young  Doctor 
grasped  it. 

Suddenly  the  latter  said :  "You  are  sure  you 
[96] 


A      STORY      TO      BE      TOLD 


will  not  be  sorry4?  You  are  sure  it  is  not  a  mood 
of  the  moment  due  to  physical  weakness1?" 

"Quite  sure.  I  determined  on  it  the  day  I  was 
shot — and  before  I  was  shot." 

"All  right."     The  Young  Doctor  disappeared. 


[97] 


CHAPTER  VI 

'HERE    ENDETH    THE 
FIRST    LESSON" 


THE  stillness  of  a  summer's  day  in  Prairie 
Land  has  all  the  characteristics  of  music. 
That  is  not  so  paradoxical  as  it  seems.  The  effect 
of  some  music  is  to  produce  a  divine  quies- 
cence of  the  senses,  a  suspension  of  motion  and 
aggressive  life,  to  reduce  existence  to  mere  pulsa- 
tion. It  was  this  kind  of  feeling  which  per- 
vaded that  region  of  sentient  being  when  Shiel 
Crozier  told  his  story.  The  sounds  that 
.sprinkled  the  general  stillness  were  in  themselves 
sleepy  notes  of  the  pervasive  music  of  somnolent 
nature — the  sough  of  the  pine  at  the  door,  the 
murmur  of  insect  life,  the  low,  thudding  beat  of 
the  steam-thrasher  out  of  sight  hard  by,  the  pur- 
ring of  the  cat  in  the  arms  of  Kitty  Tynan  as, 
with  fascinated  eyes,  she  listened  to  a  man  tell 

[98] 


AS  STRANGELY   MAGNETIC,    THIS  TALK  OF  A   MAN   S  I.IFK. 


HERE      ENDETH      THE      LESSON 

the  tale  of  a.  life  as  distant  from  that  which  she 
lived  as  she  was  from  Eve. 

She  felt  more  awed  than  curious  as  the  tale 
went  on;  it  even  seemed  to  her  she  was  listening 
to  a  theme  beyond  her  sphere,  like  some  shameless 
eavesdropper  at  the  curtains  of  a  secret  cere- 
monial. Once  or  twice  she  looked  at  her  mother 
and  at  the  Young  Doctor,  as  though  to  reassure 
herself  that  she  was  not  a  vulgar  intruder.  It 
was  far  more  impressive  to  her  and  to  the  Young 
Doctor,  too,  than  the  scene  at  the  Logan  Trial 
when  a  man  was  sentenced  to  death.  It  was 
strangely  magnetic,  this  tale  of  a  man's  exist- 
ence ;  and  the  clock  which  sounded  so  loud  on  the 
mantelpiece,  as  it  mechanically  ticked  off  the 
time,  seemed  only  part  of  some  mysterious  ma- 
chinery of  life.  Once  a  dove  swept  down  upon 
the  window-sill,  and,  peering  in,  filled  one  of  the 
pauses  in  the  recital  with  its  deep  contralto  note, 
and  then  fled  like  a  small  blue  cloud  into  the  wide 
— and  as  it  seemed — everlasting  space  beyond  the 
doorway. 

There  was  nothing  at  all  between  themselves 
and  the  far  sky-line  save  little  clumps  of  trees 
here  and  there,  little  clusters  of  buildings  and 
houses — no  visible  animal  life.  Everything  con- 

[99] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

spired  to  give  a  dignity  in  keeping  with  the  drama 
of  failure  being  unfolded  in  the  commonplace 
home  of  the  widow  Tynan.  Yet  the  home,  too, 
had  its  dignity.  The  engineer  father  had  had 
tastes,  and  he  had  insisted  on  plain,  unfigured  cur- 
tains and  wall-paper  and  carpets,  when  carpets 
were  used;  and  though  his  wife  had  at  first  pro- 
tested against  the  unfigured  carpets  as  more  dif- 
ficult to  keep  clean  and  as  showing  the  dirt  too 
easily,  she  had  come  to  like  the  one-colour  scheme, 
and  in  that  respect  her  home  had  an  individuality 
rare  in  her  surroundings. 

That  was  why  Kitty  Tynan  had  always  a 
good  background;  for  what  her  bright  colouring 
would  have  been  in  the  midst  of  gaudy,  cheap 
chintzes  and  "axminsters"  such  as  abounded  in 
Askatoon,  is  better  left  to  the  imagination.  It 
was  not,  therefore,  in  sordid,  mean,  or  incongru- 
ous surroundings  that  Crozier  told  his  tale;  as 
would  no  doubt  have  been  arranged  by  a  drama- 
tist, if  he  had  had  the  making  of  the  story  and  the 
setting  of  it;  and  if  it  were  not  a  true  tale  given 
just  as  it  happened;  as  every  one  in  Askatoon  now 
knows. 

Perhaps  the  tale  was  the  more  impressive  be- 
cause of  Crozier's  deep  barytone  voice,  capable, 
[100] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE      LESSON 

as  it  was,  of  much  modulation,  yet,  except  when 
lie  was  greatly  excited,  preserving  a  monotone 
like  the  note  of  a  violin  with  the  mute  upon  the 
strings. 

This  was  his  tale: — 

"Well,  to  begin  with,  I  was  born  at  Castle- 
garry,  in  County  Kerry — you  know  the  main 
facts  from  what  I  said  in  court.  As  a  boy  I 
wasn't  so  bad  a  sort.  I  had  one  peculiarity.  I 
always  wanted  'to  have  something  on,'  as  John 
Sibley  would  say.  No  matter  what  it  was,  I  must 
have  something  on  it.  And  I  was  very  lucky — 
worse  luck!" 

They  all  laughed  at  the  bull.  "I  feel  at  home 
at  once,"  murmured  the  Young  Doctor,  for  he 
had  come  from  near  Enniskillen  years  agone,  and 
there  is  not  so  much  difference  between  Ennis- 
killen and  Kerry  when  it  comes  to  Irish  bulls. 

"Worse  luck,  it  was,"  continued  Crozier,  "be- 
cause it  made  me  confident  of  always  winning, 
particularly  as  I  gained  in  confidence.  It's  hard 
to  say  how  early  I  began  to  believe  that  I  could 
see  things  that  were  going  to  happen.  By  the 
hour  I  used  to  shake  the  dice  on  the  billiard-table 
at  Castlegarry,  trying  to  see  with  my  eyes  shut 
the  numbers  that  were  to  come  up.  Of  course 

[101] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

now  and  then  I  saw  the  right  numbers;  and  it 
deepened  the  conviction  that  if  I  cultivated  the 
gift  I'd  be  able  to  be  right  nearly  every  time. 
When  I  went  to  a  horse-race  I  used  to  fasten  my 
mind  on  the  signal,  and  tried  to  see  beforehand 
the  number  of  the  winner.  Again  sometimes  I 
was  very  right  indeed,  and  that  deepened  my  con- 
fidence in  myself.  I  was  always  at  it.  I'd  try 
and  guess — try  and  see — the  number  of  the  hymn 
which  was  on  the  paper  in  the  vicar's  hand  before 
he  gave  it  out,  and  I  would  bet  with  myself  on 
it.  I  would  bet  with  myself  or  with  anybody 
available  on  any  conceivable  thing — the  minutes 
late  a  train  would  be;  the  pints  of  milk  a  cow 
would  give ;  the  people  who  would  be  at  the  hunt 
breakfast;  the  babies  that  would  be  christened  on 
n  Sunday;  the  number  of  eyes  in  a  peck  of  raw 
potatoes.  I  was  out  against  the  universe.  But 
it  wasn't  serious  at  all — just  a  boy's  mania — till 
one  day  my  father  met  me  in  London  when  I 
came  down  from  Oxford,  and  took  me  to  Brooks' s 
Club  in  St.  James's  Street.  There  was  the  thing 
that  finished  me.  I  was  twenty-one,  and  rest- 
less-minded, and  with  eyes  wide  open. 

"Well,  he  took  me  to  Brooks's  where  I  was  to 
become  a  member,  and  after  a  little  while  he  left 

[102] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE      LESSON 

me  to  go  and  have  a  long  powwow  with  the  com- 
mittee— he  was  a  member  of  it.  He  told  me 
quite  needlessly  to  make  myself  at  home,  and  I 
did  so  as  soon  as  his  back  was  turned.  Almost 
the  first  thing  with  which  I  became  sociable  was 
a  book  which,  as  soon  as  I  looked  at  it,  had  a 
fascination  for  me.  The  binding  was  very  old, 
and  the  leather  was  worn,  as  you  will  see  the 
leather  of  a  pocketbook,  till  it  looks  and  feels 
like  a  nice  soap.  That  book  brought  me  here." 

He  paused,  and  in  the  silence  the  Young  Doc- 
tor pushed  a  glass  of  milk  and  brandy  toward 
him.  He  sipped  the  contents.  The  others  were 
in  a  state  of  tension.  Kitty  Tynan's  eyes  were 
fixed  on  him  as  though  hypnotised,  and  the  Young 
Doctor  was  scarcely  less  interested;  while  the 
widow  of  the  departed  engineer  knitted  harder 
and  faster  than  she  had  ever  done,  and  she  could 
knit  very  fast  indeed. 

"It  was  the  betting-book  of  Brooks's,  and  it 
dated  back  almost  to  the  time  of  the  conquest  of 
Quebec.  Great  men  dead  and  gone  long  ago — 
near  a  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago — had  put 
down  their  bets  in  the  book,  for  Brooks's  was  then 
what  it  is  now,  the  highest  and  best  sporting  club 
in  the  world." 

[103] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

Kitty  Tynan's  face  had  a  curious  look,  for  there 
was  a  club  in  Askatoon,  and  it  was  said  that  all 
the  "sports"  assembled  there.  She  had  no  idea 
what  Brooks's  Club  in  St.  James's  Street  would 
look  like;  but  that  did  not  matter.  She  sup- 
posed it  must  be  as  big  as  the  Askatoon  Court 
House  at  least. 

"Bets — bets — -bets  by  men  whose  names  were 
in  every  history,  and  the  names  of  their  sons  and 
grandsons  and  great-grandsons ;  and  all  betting  on 
the  oddest  things  as  well  as  the  most  natural 
things  in  the  world.  Some  of  the  bets  made  were 
as  mad  as  the  bets  I  made  myself.  Oh!  ridicu- 
lous, some  of  them  were;  and  then  again  bets  on 
things  that  stirred  the  world  to  the  centre,  from 
the  loss  of  America  to  the  beheading  of  Louis 
XVI. 

"It  was  strange  enough  to  see  the  half-dozen 
lines  of  a  bet  by  a  marquis  whose  great-grandson 
bet  on  the  Franco-German  War,  that  the  govern- 
ment which  imposed  the  tea-tax  in  America  would 
be  out  of  power  within  six  months;  or  that  the 
French  Canadians  would  join  the  colonists  in 
what  is  now  the  United  States  if  they  revolted. 
This  would  be  side  by  side  with  a  bet  that  an  heir 
would  be  born  to  one  new-married  couple  before 
[104] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE      LESSON 

another  couple.  The  very  last  bet  made  on  the 
day  I  opened  the  book  was  that  Queen  Victoria 
would  make  Lord  Salisbury  a  duke,  that  a  certain 
gentleman  known  as  S.  S.  could  find  his  own  door 
in  St.  James's  Square  blindfolded  from  the  club, 
and  that  Corsair  would  win  the  Derby. 

"For  two  long  hours  I  sat  forgetful  of  the 
world  and  all  in  it,  while  I  read  that  record — 
to  me  the  most  interesting  the  world  could  offer. 
Every  line  was  part  of  the  history  of  the  coun- 
try, a  part  of  the  history  of  many  lives,  and  it  was 
all  part  of  the  ritual  of  the  temple  of  the  great 
god  Chance.  I  was  fascinated,  lost  in  a  land 
of  wonders.  Men  came  and  went,  but  silently. 
At  last  a  gentleman  came  whose  picture  I 
had  so  often  seen  in  the  papers — a  man  as 
well  known  in  the  sporting  world  as  was  Cham- 
berlain in  the  political  world.  He  was  dressed 
spectacularly,  but  his  face  oozed  good-nature, 
though  his  eyes  were  like  bright  bits  of  coal.  He 
bred  horses,  he  raced  this,  he  backed  that,  he  laid 
against  the  other;  he  was  one  of  the  greatest 
plungers,  one  of  the  biggest  figures  on  the  turf. 
He  had  been  a  kind  of  god  to  me — a  god  in  a 
grey  frock-coat  with  a  grey  top-hat  and  field- 
glasses  slung  over  his  shoulder;  or  in  a  hunting- 

[105] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

suit  of  the  most  picturesque  kind — great  pockets 
in  a  well-fitting  coat,  splendid  striped  waistcoat 
— well,  there,  I  only  mention  this  because  it 
played  so  big  a  part  in  bringing  me  to  Askatoon. 

"He  came  up  to  the  table  where  I  sat  in  the 
room  with  the  beautiful  Adam's  fireplace  and  the 
ceiling  like  an  architrave  of  Valhalla,  and  said: 
'Do  you  mind — for  one  minute*?'  and  he  reached 
out  a  hand  for  the  book. 

"I  gave  it  to  him,  and  I  suppose  my  admiration 
showed  in  my  eyes,  because  as  he  hastily  wrote — 
what  a  generous  scrawl  it  was! — he  said  to  me, 
'Haven't  we  met  somewhere  before"?  I  seem  to 
remember  your  face.' 

"Great  gentleman,  I  thought,  because  I  knew 
that  he  knew  he  had  never  seen  me  before,  and 
I  was  overcome  by  the  reflection  that  he  wished 
to  be  civil  in  that  way  to  me.  'It's  my  father's 
face  you  remember,  I  should  think,'  I  answered. 
'He  is  a  member  here.  I  am  only  a  visitor.  I 
haven't  been  elected  yet.'  'Ah,  we  must  see  to 
that!'  he  said  with  a  smile,  and  laid  a  hand  on 
my  shoulder  as  though  he'd  known  me  many  a 
year — and  I  only  twenty-one.  'Who  is  your 
father?'  he  asked.  When  I  told  him  he  nodded. 
'Yes,  yes,  I  know  him — Crozier  of  Castlegarry, 

[106] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE      LESSON 

but  I  knew  his  father  much  better,  though  he  was 
so  much  older  than  me,  and  indeed,  your  grand- 
father also.  Look — in  this  book  is  the  first  bet 
I  ever  made  here  after  my  election  to  the  club, 
and  it  was  made  with  your  grandfather.  There's 
no  age  in  the  kingdom  of  sport,  dear  lad,'  he 
added,  laughing — 'neither  age  nor  sex  nor  posi- 
tion nor  place.  It's  the  one  democratic  thing  in 
the  modern  world.  It's  a  republic  inside  this  old 
monarchy  of  ours.  Look,  here  it  is,  my  first  bet 
with  your  grandfather — and  I'm  only  sixty  now !' 
He  smoothed  the  page  with  his  hand  in  a  man- 
ner such  as  I  have  seen  a  dean  do  with  his  sermon- 
paper  in  a  cathedral  pulpit.  'Here  it  is,  thirty- 
six  years  ago.'  He  read  the  bet  aloud.  It  was 
on  the  Derby,  he  himself  having  bet  that  the 
Prince  of  Wales's  horse  would  win.  'Your 
grandfather,  dear  lad,'  he  repeated,  'but  you'll  find 
no  bets  of  mine  with  your  father.  He  didn't  in- 
herit that  strain,  but  your  grandfather  and  your 
great-grandfather  had  it — sportsmen  both,  afraid 
of  nothing,  with  big  minds,  great  eyes  for  seeing, 
and  a  sense  for  a  winner  almost  uncanny.  Have 
you  got  it  by  any  chance?  Yes,  yes,  by  George 
and  by  John,  I  see  you  have — you  are  your  grand- 
father to  a  hair !  His  portrait  is  here  in  the  club 
[107] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

— in  the  next  room.  Have  a  look  at  it.  He 
was  only  forty  when  it  was  done,  and  you're  very 
like  him — the  cut  of  the  jib  is  there.'  He  took 
my  hand.  'Good-bye,  dear  lad,'  he  said;  'we'll 
meet — yes,  we'll  meet  often  enough  if  you  are 
like  your  grandfather.  And  I'll  always  like  to 
see  you,'  he  added  generously. 

"  'I  always  wanted  to  see  you,'  I  answered. 
'I've  cut  your  pictures  out  of  the  papers  to  keep 
them — at  Eton  and  Oxford.'  He  laughed  in 
great  good-humour  and  pride.  'So  so,  so  so,  and 
I  am  a  hero — I've  got  one  follower !  Well,  well, 
dear  lad,  I  don't  often  go  wrong,  or  anyhow  I'm 
oftener  right  than  wrong,  and  you  might  do  worse 
than  follow  me — but  no,  I  don't  want  that  re- 
sponsibility. Go  on  your  own — go  on  your 
own.' 

"A  minute  more  and  he  was  gone  with  a  wave 
of  the  hand,  and  in  excitement  I  picked  up  the 
betting-book.  It  almost  took  my  breath  away. 
He  had  staked  a  thousand  pounds  that  the  fa- 
vourite of  the  Derby  would  not  win  the  race,  and 
that  one  of  three  outsiders  would.  As  I  sat  over- 
powered by  the  magnitude  of  the  bet  the  door 
opened,  and  he  appeared  with  another  man — not 
one  with  whose  face  I  was  then  familiar,  though 
[108] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE 


as  a  duke  and  owner  of  great  possessions,  he  was 
familiar  to  society.  'I've  put  it  down,'  he  said. 
'Sign  it,  if  it's  all  in  order.'  This  the  duke  did 
after  apologising  for  disturbing  me.  He  looked 
at  me  keenly  as  he  turned  away.  'Not  the  most 
elevating  literature  in  the  library,'  he  said,  smil- 
ing ironically.  'If  you  haven't  got  a  taste  for  it 
beyond  control,  don't  cultivate  it.'  He  nodded 
kindly,  and  left;  and  again,  till  my  father  came 
and  found  me,  I  buried  myself  in  that  book  of 
fate — to  me.  I  found  many  entries  in  my  grand- 
father's name,  but  not  one  in  my  father's  name. 
I  have  an  idea  that  when  a  vice  or  virtue  skips 
one  generation,  it  appears  with  increased  violence 
or  persistence  in  the  next,  for  passing  over  my 
father  into  my  defenceless  breast,  the  spirit  of 
sport  went  mad  in  me — or  almost  so.  No  miser 
ever  had  a  more  cheerful  and  happy  hour  than  I 
had  as  I  read  the  betting-book  at  Brooks's.  That 
is  where  it  all  started,  the  train  of  events  which 
brought  me  here. 

"I  became  a  member  of  Brooks's  soon  after  I 
left  Oxford.  As  some  men  go  to  the  Temple, 
some  to  the  Stock  Exchange,  some  to  Parliament, 
I  went  to  Brooks's.  It  was  the  centre  of  my  in- 
terest, and  I  took  chambers  in  Park  Place,  St. 
[109] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

James's  Street,  a  few  steps  away.  Here  I  met 
again  constantly  the  great  sportsman  who  had  no- 
ticed me  so  kindly,  and  I  became  his  follower,  his 
disciple.  I  had  started  with  him  on  a  wave  of 
prejudice  in  his  favour;  because  that  day  when 
I  read  in  the  betting-book  what  he  had  staked 
against  the  favourite,  I  laid  all  the  cash  and  credit 
I  could  get  with  his  outsiders  and  against  the  fa- 
vourite, and  I  won  five  hundred  pounds.  What 
he  won — to  my  youthful  eyes — was  fabulous. 
There's  no  use  saying  what  you  think — you  good 
friends,  who've  always  done  something  in  life — 
that  I  was  a  good-for-nothing  creature  to  give  my- 
self up  to  the  turf,  to  horses  and  jockeys,  and  the 
janissaries  of  sport.  You  must  remember  that 
for  generations  my  family  had  run  on  a  very  nar- 
rov/  margin  of  succession,  there  seldom  if  ever 
eing  more  than  two  born  in  any  generation  of 
the  family,  so  that  there  was  always  enough  for 
the  younger  son  or  daughter;  and  to  take  up  a 
profession  was  not  necessary  for  livelihood.  If 
my  mother,  who  was  an  intellectual  and  able 
woman,  had  lived,  it's  hard  to  tell  what  I  should 
have  become;  for  steered  aright,  given  true  ideas 
of  what  life  should  mean  to  a  man,  I  might  have 
become  ambitious  and  forged  ahead  in  one  direc- 

[110] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE      LESSON 

tion  or  another.  But  there  it  was — she  died  when 
I  was  ten,  and  there  was  no  one  to  mould  me.  At 
Eton,  at  Oxford — well,  they  are  not  preparatory 
schools  to  the  business  of  life.  And  when  at 
twenty-four  I  inherited  the  fortune  my  mother 
left  me,  I  had  only  one  idea — to  live  the  life  of 
a  sporting  gentleman.  I  had  a  name  as  a 
cricketer — " 

"Ah — I  remember,  Crozier  of  Lammis!"  in- 
terjected the  Young  Doctor  involuntarily.  "I'm 
a  north  of  Ireland  man,  but  I  remember — " 

"Yes,  Lammis,"  the  sick  man  went  on.  "Cas- 
tlegarry  was  my  father's  place,  but  my  mother 
left  me  Lammis.  When  I  got  control  of  it,  and 
of  the  securities  she  left,  I  felt  my  oats,  as  they 
say;  and  I  wasn't  long  in  making  a  show  of  cour- 
age, not  to  say  rashness,  in  following  my  leader. 
He  gave  me  luck  for  a  time,  indeed  so  great  that 
I  could  even  breed  horses  of  my  own.  But  the 
luck  went  against  him  at  last,  and  then,  of  course, 
against  me;  and  I  began  to  feel  that  suction 
which,  as  it  draws  the  cash  out  of  your  pocket, 
the  credit  out  of  your  bank,  seems  to  draw  also 
the  whole  internal  economy  out  of  your  body — a 
ghastly,  empty,  collapsing  thing." 

Mrs.  Tynan  gave  a  great  sigh.  She  had  once 
[ill] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

put  two  hundred  dollars  in  a  mine — on  paper — 
and  it  ended  in  a  lawsuit;  and  on  the  verdict  in 
the  lawsuit  depended  the  two  hundred  dollars 
and  more.  When  she  read  a  fatal  telegram  to 
her  saying  that  all  was  lost  she  had  had  that 
empty,  collapsing  feeling. 

Pausing  for  a  moment  in  which  he  sipped  some 
milk,  Crozier  then  continued:  "At  last  my  leader 
died,  and  the  see-saw  of  fortune  began  for  me; 
and  a  good  deal  of  my  sound  timber  was  sawed 
into  logs  and  made  into  lumber  to  build  some 
one  else's  fortune — on  the  turf.  You  never 
know  who  it  is  that  eats  up  your  porridge! 
When  things  were  balancing  pretty  easily,  I 
married.  It  wasn't  a  sordid  business  to  restore 
my  fortunes — I'll  say  that  for  myself;  but  it 
wasn't  the  thing  to  do,  for  I  wasn't  secure  in  my 
position.  I  might  go  on  the  rocks ;  but  was  there 
ever  a  gambler  who  didn't  believe  that  he'd  pull 
it  off  in  a  big  way  next  time,  and  that  the  turn 
of  the  wheel  against  him  was  only  to  tame  his 
spirit*?  Was  there  ever  a  gambler  or  sportsman 
of  my  class  who  didn't  talk  about  the  'law  of 
chances,'  on  the  basis  that  if  red,  as  it  were,  came 
up  three  times,  black  stood  a  fair  chance  of  com- 
ing up  the  fourth  time*?  A  silly  enough  con- 

[112] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE 


elusion;  for  on  the  law  of  chances  there's  no  rea- 
son why  red  shouldn't  come  up  three  hundred 
times;  and  so  I  found  that  your  run  of  bad  luck 
may  be  so  long  that  you  can  not  have  a  chance  to 
recover,  and  are  out  of  it  before  the  wheel  turns 
in  your  favour.  I  oughtn't  to  have  married." 

His  voice  had  changed  in  tone,  his  look  become 
most  grave,  there  was  something  very  like  a  look 
of  awe  in  his  face,  of  deprecating  submission  in 
his  eyes.  His  fingers  fussed  with  the  rug  that 
covered  his  knees. 

"God  help  the  man  that's  afraid  of  his  own 
wife!"  remarked  the  Young  Doctor  to  himself, 
not  erroneously  reading  the  expression  of  Cro- 
zier's  face  and  the  tone  of  his  voice.  "There's 
nothing  so  unnerving." 

"No,  I  oughtn't  to  have  done  it,"  Crozier  went 
on.  "But  I  will  say  again  it  wasn't  a  sordid 
marriage,  though  she  had  expectations,  great  ex- 
pectations— but  not  immediate;  and  she  was  a 
girl  of  great  character.  She  was  able  and  bril- 
liant and  splendid  and  far-seeing,  and  she  knew 
her  own  mind,  and  was  radiantly  handsome." 

Kitty  Tynan  almost  sniffed.  Through  a  whole 
-fortnight  she  had,  with  a  courage  and  a  right- 
mindedness  quite  remarkable,  fought  her  infatua- 
[113] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

tion  for  this  man,  and  as  she  fought  she  had  imag- 
ined a  hundred  times  what  his  wife  was  like.  She 
had  pictured  to  herself  a  gossamer  kind  of  woman, 
delicate,  and  in  contour  like  one  of  the  fashion- 
plate  figures  she  saw  in  the  picture-papers.  She 
had  imagined  her  with  a  wide,  drooping  hat,  with 
a  soft,  clinging  gown,  and  a  bodice  like  a  great 
white  handkerchief  crossed  on  her  breast,  holding 
a  basket  of  flowers,  while  a  King  Charles  spaniel 
gambolled  at  her  feet. 

This  was  what  she  had  imagined  with  a  kind 
of  awe;  but  the  few  words  Crozier  had  said  of 
her  gave  the  impression  of  a  Juno  commanding 
and  exacting,  bullying,  sailing  on  with  this  man 
of  men  in  her  wake,  who  was  afraid  of  stepping 
on  her  train.  Why  shouldn't  she  think  that1? 
She  was  only  a  simple  prairie  girl  who  drew  her 
own  comparisons  according  to  her  kind  and  from 
what  she  knew  of  life.  So  she  imagined  Crozier's 
wife  to  have  been  a  sort  of  person  like  Zenobia 
Queen  of  Palmyra,  who  swept  up  the  dust  of  the 
universe  with  her  skirts,  and  gave  no  chance  at  all 
to  the  children  of  nature  called  Kitty,  who  wore 
skirts  scarcely  lower  than  their  ankles.  She  al- 
most sniffed,  and  she  became  angry,  too,  that  a 
man  like  Crozier,  who  had  faced  the  offensive 

[114] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE 


Augustus  Burlingame  in  the  witness-box  as  he 
did;  who  took  the  bullet  of  the  assassin  with  such 
courage;  who  broke  a  horse  like  a  Mexican;  who 
could  ride  like  a  leech  on  a  filly's  flank;  should 
crumple  up  at  the  thought  of  a  woman  who,  any- 
how, couldn't  be  taller  than  Crozier  himself  was, 
and  hadn't  a  hand  like  a  piece  of  steel  and  the 
skin  of  an  antelope.  It  was  enough  to  make  a 
cat  laugh — or  a  woman  cry  with  rage. 

"Able  and  brilliant  and  splendid  and  far-seeing 
and  radiantly  handsome!"  There  the  picture 
was  of  a  high,  haughty,  and  overbearing  woman, 
in  velvet,  or  brocade,  or  poplin — yes,  something 
stiff  and  overbearing  like  grey  poplin.  Kitty 
looked  at  herself  suddenly  in  the  mirror — the 
half-length  mirror  on  the  opposite  wall — and  she 
felt  her  hands  clench  and  her  bosom  beat  hard 
under  her  pretty  and  inexpensive  calico  frock — a 
thing  for  Chloe,  not  for  Juno. 

She  was  very  angry  with  Crozier,  for  it  was 
absurd,  that  look  of  deprecating  homage,  that  re- 
cumbent respect  in  his  face,  that  "Hush — she — is 
— coming"  in  his  eyes.  What  a  fool  a  man  was 
where  a  woman  was  concerned!  Here  she  had 
been  fighting  herself  for  a  fortnight  to  conquer 
a  useless  passion  for  her  man  of  all  the  world, 

[115] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

fit  to  command  an  array  of  giants;  and  she  saw 
him  now  almost  breathless  as  he  spoke  of  a  great 
wildcat  of  a  woman  who  ought  to  be  by  his  side 
now.  What  sort  of  a  woman  was  she  anyhow, 
who  could  let  him  go  away  as  he  had  done  and 
live  apart  from  her  all  these  years,  while  he 
"slogged  away" — that  was  the  Western  phrase 
which  came  to  her  mind — to  pull  himself  level 
with  things  again?  Her  feet  shuffled  unevenly  on 
the  floor,  and  it  would  have  been  a  joy  to  shake 
the  invalid  there  with  the  rapt  look  on  his  face. 
Unable  to  bear  the  situation  without  some 
demonstration,  she  got  to  her  feet  and  caught  up 
the  glass  of  brandy  and  milk  with  a  little  ex- 
clamation. 

"Here,"  she  said,  holding  the  glass  to  his  lips; 
"here,  keep  up  your  strength,  soldier.  You  don't 
need  to  be  afraid  at  a  five-thousand-mile 
range." 

The  Young  Doctor  started,  for  she  had  said 
what  was  in  his  own  mind,  but  what  he  would 
not  have  said  for  a  thousand  dollars.  It  was 
fortunate  that  Crozier  was  scarcely  conscious  of 
what  she  was  saying.  His  mind  was  far  away. 
Yet,  when  she  took  the  glass  from  him  again,  he 
touched  her  arm. 

[116] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE      LESSON 

"Nothing  is  good  enough  for  your  friends,  is 
it?'  he  said. 

"That  wouldn't  be  an  excuse  for  not  getting 
them  the  best  there  was  at  hand,"  she  answered 
with  a  little  laugh,  and  at  least  the  Young  Doc- 
tor read  the  meaning  of  her  words. 

Presently  Crozier,  with  a  sigh,  continued:  "If 
I  had  done  what  my  wife  wanted  from  the  start 
I  shouldn't  have  been  here.  I'd  have  saved  what 
was  left  of  a  fortune,  and  I'd  have  had  a  home 
of  my  own." 

"Is  she  earning  her  living  too1?"  asked  Kitty 
softly,  and  Crozier  did  not  notice  the  irony  under 
the  question. 

"She  has  a  home  of  her  own,"  answered  Cro- 
zier almost  sharply,  certainly  with  a  little  nerv- 
ousness. "Just  before  the  worst  came  to  the 
worst  she  inherited  her  fortune — plenty  of  it,  as 
I  got  near  the  end  of  mine.  One  thing  after  an- 
other had  gone.  I  was  mortgaged  up  to  the  eyes. 
I  knew  the  money-lenders  from  Newry  to  Jewry 
and  Jewry  to  Jerusalem.  Then  it  was  I  prom- 
ised her  I'd  bet  no  more — never  again;  I'd  give 
up  the  turf;  I'd  try  and  start  again.  Down  in 
my  soul  I  knew  I  couldn't  start  again — not  just 
then.  But  I  wanted  to  please  her.  She  was  re- 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

markable  in  her  way — one  of  the  most  imposing 
intelligences  I  have  ever  known.  So  I  promised. 
I  promised  I'd  bet  no  more." 

The  Young  Doctor  caught  Kitty  Tynan's  eyes 
by  accident,  and  there  was  the  same  look  of  un- 
derstanding in  both.  They  both  knew  that  here 
was  the  real  tragedy  of  Crozier's  life.  If  he  had 
had  less  reverence  for  his  wife,  less  of  that  ob- 
vious prostration  of  soul,  he  probably  would 
never  have  come  to  Askatoon  or  would  have  left 
Ireland. 

"I  broke  my  promise,"  he  murmured.  "It  was 
a  horse — well,  never  mind.  I  was  as  sure  of 
Flamingo  as  that  the  sun  would  rise  by  day  and 
set  by  night.  It  was  a  certainty;  and  it  was  a 
certainty.  The  horse  could  win,  it  would  win — 
I  had  it  from  a  sure  source.  My  judgment  was 
right,  too.  I  bet  heavily  on  Flamingo,  intending 
it  for  my  last  fling,  and  to  save  what  I  had  left, 
to  get  back  what  I  had  lost.  I  could  get  big  odds 
on  him.  It  was  good  enough.  From  what  I 
knew  it  was  like  picking  up  a  gold-mine.  And  I 
was  right — right  as  could  be.  There  was  no 
chance  about  it.  It  was  being  out  where  the  rain 
fell  to  get  wet.  It  was  just  being  present  when 
they  called  the  roll  of  the  good  people  that  God 

[118] 


HERE      EXDETH      THE      LESSON 

meant  to  be  kind  to.  It  meant  so  much  to  me. 
I  couldn't  bear  to  have  nothing  and  my  wife  to 
have  all.  I  simply  couldn't  stand — " 

The  Young  Doctor  met  again  the  glance  of 
Kitty  Tynan,  and  there  was  again  a  new  and 
sudden  look  of  comprehension  in  the  eyes  of  both. 
They  began  to  see  light  where  their  man  wras  con- 
cerned. 

After  a  moment  of  struggle  to  control  himself, 
Crozier  proceeded.  "It  didn't  seem  like  betting. 
Besides,  I  had  planned  it,  that  when  I  showed  her 
what  I  had  won,  she  would  shut  her  eyes  to  the 
broken  promise,  and  I'd  make  another  and  keep 
it  ever  after.  I  put  on  all  the  cash  there  was  to 
put  on — all  I  could  raise  on  what  I  had  left  of 
my  property." 

He  paused  as  though  to  get  strength  to  go  on. 
Then  a  look  of  intense  excitement  suddenly  pos- 
sessed him,  and  there  passed  over  him  a  wave  of 
feeling  which  transformed  him.  The  naturally 
grave  mediaeval  face  became  fired,  the  eyes  blazed, 
the  skin  shone,  the  mouth  almost  trembled  with 
agitation.  He  was  the  dreamer,  the  enthusiast, 
the  fanatic  almost,  with  that  look  which  the  pio- 
neer, the  discoverer,  the  adventurer  has  when  he 
sees  the  end  of  his  quest. 

[119] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR   LUCK 

His  voice  rose,  vibrated.  "It  was  a  day  to 
make  you  thank  Heaven  the  world  was  made. 
Such  days  only  come  once  in  a  while  in  England, 
but  when  they  do  come  what  price  Arcady  or 
Askatoon !  Never  had  there  been  so  big  a  Derby. 
Everybody  had  the  fever  of  the  place  at  its  worst. 
I  was  happy.  I  meant  to  pouch  my  winnings  and 
go  straight  to  my  wife  and  say  'Peccavi,'  and  I 
should  hear  her  say  to  me,  'Go  and  sin  no  more.' 
Yes  I  was  happy.  The  sky,  the  green  of  the 
fields,  the  still,  homelike,  comforting  trees,  the 
mass  of  glorious  colour,  the  hundreds  of  horses 
that  weren't  running,  and  the  scores  that  were  to 
run,  sleek  and  long,  and  made  like  shining  silk  and 
steel,  it  all  was  like  heaven  on  earth  to  me — a 
horse-race  heaven  on  earth !  There  you  have  the 
state  of  my  mind  in  those  days,  the  kind  of  man 
I  was." 

Sitting  up  he  gazed  straight  in  front  of  him  as 
though  he  saw  Epsom  Downs  before  his  eyes;  as 
though  he  was  watching  the  fateful  race  that  bore 
him  down.  He  was  terribly,  exhaustingly  alive. 
Something  possessed  him,  and  he  possessed  his 
hearers. 

"It  was  just  as  I  said  and  knew — my  horse, 
Flamingo,  stretched  away  from  the  rest  at  Tat- 
[120] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE      LESSON 

tenham  Corner  and  came  sailing  away  home  two 
lengths  ahead.  It  was  a  sight  to  last  a  lifetime, 
and  that  was  what  I  meant  it  to  be  for  me.  The 
race  was  all  Flamingo's  own,  and  the  mob  was 
going  wild,  when  all  of  a  sudden  a  woman — she 
was  the  widow  of  a  racing-man  gone  suddenly 
mad — she  rushed  out  in  front  of  the  horse, 
snatched  at  its  bridle  with  a  shrill  cry,  and  down 
she  came,  and  down  Flamingo  and  the  jockey 
came,  a  melee  of  crushed  humanity.  And  that 
was  how  I  lost  my  last  two  thousand  five  hun- 
dred pounds,  as  I  said  at  the  Logan  Trial." 

"Oh !  Oh !"  said  Kitty  Tynan,  her  face  aflame, 
her  eyes  like  topaz  suns,  her  hands  wringing. 
"Oh,  that  was — oh,  poor  Flamingo!"  she  added. 

A  strange  smile  shot  into  Crozier's  face,  and 
the  dark  passion  of  reminiscence  fled  away  from 
his  eyes.  "Yes,  you  are  right,  little  friend,"  he 
said.  "That  was  the  real  tragedy  after  all. 
There  was  the  horse  doing  his  best,  his  most 
beautiful  best,  as  though  he  knew  so  much  de- 
pended on  him,  stretching  himself  with  the  last 
ounce  of  energy  that  he  could  summon,  feeling 
the  proud  song  of  success  in  his  heart — yes,  he 
knows,  he  knows  what  he  has  done,  none  so  well ! 
— and  out  comes  a  black,  hateful  thing  against 

[121] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

him,  and  down  he  goes,  his  game  over,  his  course 
run.  I  felt  exactly  as  you  do,  and  I  felt  that  be- 
fore everything  else  when  it  happened.  Then  I 
felt  for  myself  afterward,  and  I  felt  it  hard,  as 
you  can  think." 

The  break  went  from  his  voice,  but  it  rang  with 
reflective,  remembered  misery.  "I  was  ruined. 
One  thing  was  clear  to  me.  I  would  not  live  on 
my  wife's  money.  I  would  not  eat  and  drink 
what  her  money  bought.  No,  I  would  not  live 
on  my  wife.  Her  brother,  a  good  enough  im- 
pulsive lad,  with  a  tongue  of  his  own  and  too 
small  to  thrash,  came  to  me  in  London  the  night 
of  the  race.  He  said  his  sister  had  been  in  the 
country — down  to  Epsom — and  that  she  bitterly 
resented  my  having  broken  my  promise  and  lost 
all  I  had.  He  said  he  had  never  seen  her  so  an- 
gry, and  he  gave  me  a  letter  from  her.  On  her 
return  to  town  she  had  been  obliged  to  go  away 
at  once  to  see  her  sister  taken  suddenly  ill.  He 
added,  with  an  unfeeling  jibe,  that  he  wouldn't 
like  the  reading  of  the  letter  himself.  If  he 
hadn't  been  such  a  chipmunk  of  a  fellow  I'd  have 
wrung  his  neck.  I  put  the  letter — her  letter — 
in  my  pocket,  and  next  day  gave  my  lawyer  full 
instructions  and  a  power  of  attorney.  Then  I 

[122] 


HERE      ENDETH      THE      LESSON 

went  straight  to  Glasgow,  took  steamer  for  Can- 
ada, and  here  I  am.  That  was  near  five  years  ago." 

"And  the  letter  from  your  wife*?"  asked  Kitty 
Tynan  demurely  and  slyly.  The  Young  Doctor 
looked  at  Crozier,  surprised  at  her  temerity,  but 
Crozier  only  smiled  gently.  "It  is  in  the  desk 
there.  Bring  it  to  me,  please,"  he  said. 

In  a  moment  Kitty  was  beside  him  with  the 
letter.  He  took  it,  turned  it  over,  examined  it 
carefully  as  though  seeing  it  for  the  first  time, 
and  laid  it  on  his  knee. 

"I  have  never  opened  it,"  he  said.  "There  it 
is,  just  as  it  was  handed  to  me." 

"You  don't  know  what  is  in  it1?"  asked  Kitty 
in  a  shocked  voice.  "Why,  it  may  be  that — " 

"Oh,  yes,  I  know  what  is  in  it!"  he  replied. 
"Her  brother's  confidences  were  enough.  I 
didn't  want  to  read  it.  I  can  imagine  it  all." 

"It's  pretty  cowardly,"  remarked  Kitty. 

"No,  I  think  not.  It  would  only  hurt,  and  the 
hurting  could  do  no  good.  I  can  hear  what  it 
says,  and  I  don't  want  to  see  it." 

He  held  the  letter  up  to  his  ear  whimsically. 
Then  he  handed  it  back  to  her  and  she  replaced 
it  in  the  desk. 

"So,  there  it  is,   and  there  it  is,"  he  sighed. 

[123] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

"You  have  got  my  story,  and  it's  bad  enough, 
but  you  can  see  it's  not  what  the  unwholesome 
Burlingame  suggested." 

"Burlingame — but  Burlingame's  beneath  no- 
tice," rejoined  Kitty.  "Isn't  he,  mother?" 

Mrs.  Tynan  nodded.  Then,  as  though  with 
sudden  impulse,  Kitty  came  forward  to  Crozier 
and  leaned  over  him.  The  look  of  a  mother  was 
in  her  eyes.  Somehow  she  seemed  to  herself 
twenty  years  older  than  this  man  with  the  heart 
of  a  boy,  who  was  afraid  of  his  own  wife. 

"It's  time  for  your  beef- tea,  and  when  you've 
had  it  you  must  get  your  sleep,"  she  said  with  a 
hovering  solicitude  in  her  voice. 

"I'd  like  to  give  him  a  thrashing  first,  if  you 
don't  mind,"  said  the  Young  Doctor  to  her. 

"Please  let  a  little  good  advice  satisfy  you," 
Crozier  remarked  ruefully.  "It  will  seem  like 
old  times,"  he  added  rather  bitterly. 

"You  are  too  young  to  have  had  'old  times,' ' 
said  Kitty  with  gentle  scorn.     "I'll  like  you  bet- 
ter when  you  are  older,"  she  added. 

"Naughty  jade,"  exclaimed  the  Young  Doc- 
tor, "you  ought  to  be  more  respectful  to  those 
older  than  yourself." 

"Oh,  grandpapa!"  she  retorted  mockingly. 

[124] 


CHAPTER  VII 

A   WOMAN'S    WAY    TO 
KNOWLEDGE 


THE  harvest  was  over.  The  grain  was  cut, 
the  prairie  no  longer  waved  like  a  golden 
sea,  but  the  smoke  of  the  incense  of  sacrifice  still 
rose  in  innumerable  spirals  in  the  circle  of  the 
eye.  The  ground  appeared  bare  and  ill-treated, 
like  a  sheep  first  shorn;  but  yet  nothing  could 
take  away  from  it  the  look  of  plenty,  even  as 
the  fat  sides  of  the  shorn  sheep  invite  the  satisfied 
eye  of  the  expert.  The  land  now,  all  stubble, 
still  looked  good  for  anything.  If  bare,  it  did 
not  seem  starved.  It  was  naked  and  unshaven; 
it  was  stripped  like  a  boxer  for  the  rubbing  down 
after  the  fight.  Not  so  refined  and  suggestive 
and  luxurious  as  when  it  was  clothed  with  the 
coat  of  ripe  corn  in  the  ear,  it  still  showed  the 
muscle  and  fibre  of  its  being  to  no  disadvantage. 

[125] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

And  overhead  the  joy  of  the  prairie  grew 
apace. 

September  saw  the  vast  prairie  spaces  around 
Askatoon  shorn  and  shrivelled  of  its  glory  of  rip- 
ened grain,  but  with  a  new  life  come  into  the 
air — sweet,  stinging,  vibrant  life,  which  had  the 
suggestion  of  nature  recreating  her  vitality,  in- 
flaming itself  with  Edenic  strength,  a  battery 
charging  itself,  to  charge  the  world  in  turn  with 
its  force  and  energy.  Morning  gave  pure  ela- 
tion, as  though  all  created  being  must  strive ;  noon 
was  the  pulse  of  existence  at  the  top  of  its  activ- 
ity; evening  was  glamorous;  and  all  the  lower 
sky  was  spread  with  those  colours  which  Titian 
stole  from  the  joyous  horizon  that  filled  his  eyes. 
There  was  in  that  evening  light  somehow  just  a 
touch  of  pensiveness — the  triste  delicacy  of  helio- 
trope, harbinger  of  the  Indian  summer  soon  to 
come,  when  the  air  would  make  all  sensitive  souls 
turn  to  the  past  and  forget  that  to-morrow  was 
all  in  all. 

Sensitive  souls,  however,  are  not  so  many  as  to 
crowd  each  other  unduly  in  this  world,  and  they 
were  not  more  multitudinous  in  Askatoon  than 
elsewhere.  Not  everybody  was  taking  joy  of 
sunrises  and  losing  himself  in  the  delicate  con- 

[126] 


A      WOMAN      S      WAY      TO      KNOWLEDGE 

tentment  of  the  sunset.  There  were  many  who 
took  it  all  without  thought,  who  absorbed  it  un- 
consciously, and  got  something  from  it;  though 
there  were  many  others  who  got  nothing  out  of 
it  at  all,  save  the  health  and  comfort  brought 
by  a  precious  climate  whose  solicitous  friend  is 
the  sun.  These  heeded  it  little,  even  though  a 
good  number  of  them  came  from  the  damp  is- 
lands lying  between  the  north  Atlantic  and  the 
German  Ocean.  From  Erin  and  England  and  the 
land  o'  cakes  they  came,  had  a  few  days  of  star- 
ing bright-eyed  happy  incredulity  as  to  the  per- 
manency of  such  conditions,  and  then  settled 
down  to  take  it  as  it  was — endless  days  of  sun- 
shine and  stirring  vivacious  air — as  though  they 
had  always  known  it  and  had  it. 

There  were  exceptions,  and  these  had  joy  in 
what  they  saw  and  felt  according  to  the  measure 
of  their  temperament.  Shiel  Crozier  saw  and 
felt  much  of  it,  and  probably  the  Young  Doctor 
saw  and  felt  it  as  much  as  any  one;  stray  peo- 
ple here  and  there  who  take  no  part  in  this  vera- 
cious tale,  had  it  in  greater  or  less  degree;  fat 
Jesse  Bulrush  was  so  sensitive  to  it  that  he,  as 
he  himself  said,  "almost  leaked  sentimentality," 
and  Kitty  Tynan  had  it  in  rare  measure.  She 
[127] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

was  beating  with  life,  as  a  bird  drunken  with 
the  air's  sweetness  sings  itself  into  an  abandon- 
ment of  motion. 

Before  Crozier  came  she  had  enjoyed  existence 
as  existence,  wondering  often  why  it  was  she 
wanted  to  spring  up  from  the  ground  with  the 
idea  that  she  could  fly,  if  she  chose  to  try.  Once 
when  she  was  quite  a  little  girl  she  had  said  to 
her  mother,  "I'm  going  to  ile  away,"  and  her 
mother,  puzzled,  asked  her  what  she  meant. 
Her  reply  was,  "It  is  in  the  hymn."  Her  mother 
persisted  in  asking  what  hymn ;  and  was  told  with 
something  like  scorn  that  it  was  the  hymn  she 
herself  had  taught  her  only  child — "I'll  away,  I'll 
away  to  the  Promised  Land." 

She  had  thought  that  "I'll  away"  meant  that 
there  was  some  delicious  motion  which  was  to 
ile,  and  she  had  visions  of  something  between 
floating  and  flying  as  being  that  blessed  means 
of  transportation. 

As  the  years  grew,  she  still  wanted  to  "ile 
away"  whenever  the  spirit  of  elation  came  upon 
her,  and  it  had  increased  greatly  since  Shiel  Cro- 
zier came.  Out  of  her  star  as  he  was,  she  still 
felt  near  to  him,  and  as  though  she  understood 
him  and  he  comprehended  her.  He  had  almost 
[128] 


A      WOMAN      S      WAY      TO      KNOWLEDGE 

at  once  become  to  her  an  admired  and  splendid 
mystery  which,  however,  at  first  she  did  not  dare 
wish  to  solve.  She  had  been  content  to  be  a  kind 
of  handmaiden  to  a  generous  and  adored  master. 
She  knew  that  where  he  had  been  she  could  in 
one  sense  never  go,  and  yet  she  wanted  to  be  near 
him  just  the  same.  This  was  intensified  after 
the  Logan  Trial  and  the  shooting  of  the  man  who 
somehow  seemed  to  have  made  her  live  in  a  new 
way. 

As  long  ago  as  she  could  recall  she  had,  in  a 
crude,  untutored  way,  been  fond  of  the  things 
that  nature  made  beautiful;  but  now  she  seemed 
to  see  them  in  a  new  light;  but  not  because  any 
one  had  deliberately  taught  her.  Indeed,  it 
bored  her  almost  to  hear  books  read  as  Jesse  Bul- 
rush and  Nurse  Egan  and  the  Young  Doctor,  and 
even  her  mother,  read  them  to  Crozier  after  his 
operation,  to  help  him  pass  away  the  time.  The 
only  time  she  ever  cared  to  listen — at  school, 
though  quick  and  clever,  she  had  never  cared  for 
the  printed  page — was  when,  by  chance,  poetry 
or  verses  were  read  or  recited.  Then  she  would 
listen  eagerly,  not  attracted  by  the  words,  but  by 
the  music  of  the  lines,  by  the  rhyme  and  rhythm, 
by  the  underlying  feeling;  and  she  got  something 
[129] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

out  of  it  which  had  in  one  sense  nothing  to  do 
with  the  verses  themselves  or  with  the  conception 
of  the  poet. 

Curiously  enough,  she  most  liked  to  hear  Jesse 
Bulrush  read,  and  he  was  the  only  man  who  read 
poems  of  his  own  initiative.  He  was  a  born  sen- 
timentalist, and  this  became  by  no  means  subtly 
apparent  to  Kitty  during  Crozier's  illness. 
Whenever  Nurse  Egan  was  on  duty  Jesse  con- 
trived to  be  about,  and  to  make  himself  useful 
and  ornamental  too;  for  he  was  a  picturesque 
figure,  with  a  taste  for  figured  waistcoats  and 
clean  linen — he  always  washed  his  own  white 
trousers  and  waistcoats,  and  he  had  a  taste  in 
ties  which  he  made  for  himself  out  of  silk  bought 
by  the  yard.  He  was,  in  fact,  a  clean,  whole- 
some man,  with  a  flair  for  material  things,  as  he 
had  shown  in  the  land  proposal  on  which  Shiel 
Crozier's  fortunes  hung,  but  with  no  gift  for  car- 
rying them  out,  having  neither  constructive  abil- 
ity nor  continuity  of  purpose.  Yet  he  was  an 
agreeable,  humorous,  sentimental  soul,  who  at 
fifty  years  of  age  found  himself  "an  old  bach," 
as  he  called  himself,  in  love  at  last  with  a  middle- 
aged  nurse  with  dark-brown  hair  and  set  figure, 
[180] 


A    WOMAN'S    WAY    TO    KNOWLEDGE 

keen,  intelligent  eyes,  and  a  most  cheerful,  orderly 
and  soothing  way  with  her. 

Before  Shiel  Crozier  was  taken  ill  their  ro- 
mance began;  but  it  grew  in  volume  and  intensity 
after  the  trial  and  the  shooting,  when  they  met 
by  the  bedside  of  the  wounded  man.  Jesse  had 
been  away  so  much  in  different  parts  of  the  coun- 
try before  then  that  their  individual  merits  never 
had  had  a  real  chance  to  make  permanent  impres- 
sion. By  accident,  however,  his  business  made 
it  necessary  for  him  to  be  much  in  Askatoon  at 
the  moment,  and  it  was  a  propitious  time  for  the 
growth  of  the  finer  feelings. 

It  had  given  Jesse  Bulrush  real  satisfaction 
that  Kitty  Tynan  listened  to  his  reading  of  poetry 
— Longfellow,  Byron,  Tennyson,  Whyte  Mel- 
ville, and  Adam  Lindsay  Gordon  chiefly — with 
such  absorbed  interest.  His  content  was  the 
greater  because  his  lovely  nurse — he  did  think 
she  was  lovely,  as  Rubens  thought  his  painted 
ladies  beautiful,  though  their  cordial,  ample,  os- 
tentatious proportions  are  not  what  Raphael  re- 
garded as  the  lines  of  the  divine  human  figure 
— because  his  lovely  nurse  listened  to  his  fat, 
happy  voice  rising  and  falling,  swelling  and  re- 
[131] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

ceding  on  the  waves  of  verse;  though  it  meant 
nothing  to  her  beyond  the  fact  that  his  voice — 
very  pleasant  to  hear — was  having  a  good  chance 
for  display. 

This  was  not  apparent  to  her  Bulrush,  though 
Crozier  and  Kitty  understood.  Jesse  only  saw 
in  the  blue-garbed,  clear-visaged  woman  a  mis- 
tress of  his  heart,  who  had  all  the  virtues  and 
graces  and  who  did  not  talk.  That,  to  him,  was 
the  best  thing  of  all.  She  was  a  superb  listener, 
and  he  was  a  prodigious  talker — was  it  not  all 
appropriate^ 

One  day  he  went  searching  for  Kitty  at  her 
favourite  retreat,  a  little  knoll  behind  and  to  the 
left  of  the  house  where  a  half-dozen  trees  made 
a  pleasant  resting-place  at  a  fine  lookout  point. 
He  found  her  in  her  usual  place,  with  a  look  al- 
most pensive  on  her  face.  He  did  not  notice 
that,  for  he  was  visibly  excited  and  elated. 

"I  want  to  read  you  something  I've  written," 
he  said,  and  he  drew  from  his  pocket  a  paper. 

"If  it's  another  description  of  the  timberland 
you  have  for  sale — please,  not  to  me,"  she  an- 
swered provokingly,  for  she  guessed  well  what 
he  held  in  his  hand.  She  had  seen  him  writing 
it.  She  had  even  seen  some  of  the  lines  scrawled 

[132] 


A      WOMAN      S      WAY      TO      KNOWLEDGE 

and  rescrawled  on  bits  of  paper,  showing  careful 
if  not  swift  and  skilful  manufacture.  One  of 
these  crumpled-up  bits  of  paper  she  had  in  her 
pocket  now,  having  recovered  it  that  she  might 
tease  him  by  quoting  the  lines  at  a  provoking 
opportunity. 

"It's  not  that.  It's  some  verses  I've  written," 
he  said  with  a  wave  of  his  hand. 

"All  your  own"?"  she  asked  with  an  air  of  as- 
sumed innocent  interest,  and  he  did  not  see  the 
frivolous  gleam  in  her  eyes,  or  notice  the  touch 
of  aloes  on  her  tongue. 

"Yes.  Yes.  I've  always  written  verses  more 
or  less — I  write  a  good  many  advertisements  in 
verse,"  he  added  cheerfully.  "They  are  very 
popular — not  genius,  quite,  but  there  it  is,  the 
gift;  and  it  has  its  uses  in  commerce  as  in  affairs 
of  the  heart.  But  if  you'd  rather  not,  if  it  makes 
you  tired — " 

"Courage,  soldier,  bear  your  burden !"  she  said 
gaily.  "Mount  your  horse  and  get  galloping," 
she  added,  motioning  him  to  sit. 

A  moment  later  he  was  pouring  out  his  soul 
through  a  succulent  and  pleasing  voice,  from  fat 
lips,  flanked  by  a  high-coloured,  healthy  cheek 
like  a  russet  apple: 

[133] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"Like  jewels  of  the  sky  they  gleam, 

Your  eyes  of  light,  your  eyes  of  fire; 
In  their  dark  depths  behold  the  dream 

Of  Life's  glad  hope  and  Love's  desire. 

"Above  your  quiet  brow,  endowed 

With    Grecian    charm    to    crown    your    grace, 
Your  hair  in  one  soft  Titian  cloud 

Throws  heavenly  shadows  on  your  face." 

"Well,  I've  never  had  verses  written  to  me 
before,"  Kitty  remarked  demurely  when  he  had 
finished  and  sat  looking  at  her  questioningly. 
"But  'dark  depths' — that  isn't  the  right  thing  to 
say  of  my  eyes!  And  Titian  cloud  of  hair — 
is  my  hair  Titian?  I  thought  Titian  hair  was 
bronzy — tawny  was  what  Mr.  Burlingame  called 
it  when  he  was  spouting," — her  upper  lip  curled 
in  contempt. 

"It  isn't  you,  and  you  know  it,"  he  replied 
jerkily. 

She  bridled.  "Do  you  mean  to  say  that  you 
come  and  read  to  me  without  a  word  of  explana- 
tion, so  that  I  shouldn't  misunderstand,  verses 
written  for  another1?  Do  you  mean  to  say  that 
my  eyes  aren't  eyes  of  light  and  eyes  of  fire,  that 
I  haven't  got  a  Grecian  brow*?  Do  you  mean  to 
say  those  verses  don't  fit  me — except  for  the  Titian 
[134] 


A      WOMANS      WAY      TO      KNOWLEDGE 

hair  and  heavenly  shadows"?  And  that  I've  got 
no  right  to  think  they're  not  meant  for  me?  Is 
it  so,  that  a  man  that's  lived  in  my  mother's 
house  for  years,  eating  at  the  same  table  with 
the  family,  and  having  his  clothes  mended  free, 
with  supper  to  suit  him  and  no  questions  asked — 
is  it  so,  that  he  takes  up  my  time  with  poetry, 
four  lines  at  a  stretch,  and  a  rhyme  every  other 
line,  and  then  tells  me  it  isn't  for  me!" 

Her  eyes  flashed,  her  bosom  palpitated,  her 
hand  made  passionate  little  gestures,  and  she 
really  seemed  a  little  fury  let  loose.  For  a  mo- 
ment he  was  quite  deceived  by  her  acting;  he  did 
not  see  the  lurking  grin  in  the  depths  of  her  eyes. 

Her  voice  shook  with  assumed  passion.  "Be- 
cause I  didn't  show  what  I  felt  all  these  years, 
and  only  forgot  myself  and  exposed  my  real  feel- 
ings when  you  read  these  verses  to  me,  do  you 
think  any  man  who  was  a  gentleman  wouldn't  in 
the  circumstances  say,  'These  verses  are  for  you, 
Kitty  Tynan'  ?  You  betrayed  me  into  showing 
you  what  I  felt,  and  then  you  tell  me  your  verses 
are  for  another  girl !" 

"Girl!  Girl!  Girl!"  he  burst  out.  "Nurse 
is  thirty-seven — she  told  me  so  herself,  and  how 
could  I  tell  that  you — why,  it's  absurd!  I've 

[135] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

only  thought  of  you  always  as  a  baby  in  long 
skirts — "  she  spasmodically  drew  her  skirts  down 
over  her  pretty,  shapely  ankles,  while  she  kept 
her  eyes  covered  with  one  hand — "and  you've 
seen  me  makin'  up  to  her  ever  since  Crozier  got 
the  bullet.  Ever  since  he  was  operated  on, 
I've—" 

"Yes,  yes,  that's  right,"  she  interrupted. 
"That's  manly!  Put  the  blame  on  him — him 
that  couldn't  help  himself,  struck  by  a  horse- 
thief's  bullet  in  the  dark;  him  that's  no  more  to 
blame  for  your  carryings  on  while  death  was 
prowling  about  the  door  there — " 

"Carryings  on!  Carryings  on!"  Jesse  Bul- 
rush was  thoroughly  deceived  and  thoroughly  ex- 
cited and  indignant — the  little  devil  to  put  him 
in  a  hole  like  this!  "Carryings  on!  I've  acted 
like  a  man  all  through — never  anything  else  in 
your  house,  and  it's  a  shame  that  I've  got  to  lis- 
ten to  things  that  have  never  been  said  of  me 
in  all  my  life.  My  mother  was  a  good,  true 
woman,  and  she  brought  me  up — " 

"Oh,  that's  it,  put  it  on  your  mother  now,  poor 
woman!  who  isn't  here  to  stretch  out  her  hand 
and  stop  you  from  playing  a  double  game  with 
two  girls  so  placed  they  couldn't  help  themselves 

[136] 


A      WOMAN      S      WAY      TO      KNOWLEDGE 

— just  doing  kind  acts  for  a  sick  man."  Suddenly 
she  got  to  her  feet.  "I  tell  you,  Jesse  Bulrush, 
that  you're  a  man — you're  a  man — " 

But  she  could  keep  it  up  no  longer.  She  burst 
out  laughing,  and  the  false  tears  of  the  actress 
she  dashed  from  her  eyes  as  she  added:  "That 
you're  a  man  after  my  own  heart.  But  you  can't 
have  it,  even  if  you  are  after  it,  and  you  are  wel- 
come to  the  thirty-seven-year-old  seraph  in 
there!"  She  tossed  a  hand  towards  the  house. 

By  this  time  he  was  on  his  feet,  too,  almost 
bursting.  "Well,  you  wicked  little  rip — you 
Ellen  Terry  at  twenty-two,  to  think  you  could 
play  it  up  like  that!  Why,  never  on  the  stage 
was  there  such — !" 

"It's  the  poetry  made  me  do  it — it  inspired 
me,"  she  gurgled.  "I  felt — why,  I  felt  here" — 
she  pressed  her  hand  to  her  heart — "all  the  pangs 
of  unrequited  love — oh,  go  away,  go  back  to  the 
house  and  read  that  to  her !  She's  in  the  sitting- 
room,  and  my  mother's  away  down-town. 
Now's  your  chance,  Claude  Melnotte!" 

She  put  both  hands  on  his  big,  panting  chest 

and  pushed  him  backward   towards   the  house. 

"You're   good    enough    for   anybody,    and   if   I 

wasn't  so  young  and  daren't  leave  mother  till  I 

[137] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

get  my  wisdom-teeth  cut,  and  till  I'm  thirty- 
seven — oh,  oh,  oh!"  She  laughed  till  the  tears 
came  into  her  eyes.  "This  is  as  good  as — as  a 
play." 

"It's  the  best  acted  play  I  ever  saw  from  Ten 
Nights  in  a  Barroom'  to  'Struck  Oil,'  "  rejoined 
Jesse  Bulrush  with  a  face  still  half-ashamed  yet 
beaming.  "But,  tell  me,  you  heartless  little 
woman,  are  the  verses  worth  anything4?  Do  you 
think  she'll  like  them?" 

Kitty  grew  suddenly  serious,  and  a  curious  look 
he  could  not  read  deepened  in  her  eyes. 
"Nurse  '11  like  them — of  course  she  will,"  she 
said  gently.  "She'll  like  them  because  they  are 
you.  Read  them  to  her  as  you  read  them  to  me, 
and  she'll  only  hear  your  voice,  and  she'll  think 
them  clever  and  you  a  wonderful  man,  even  if 
you  are  fifty  and  weigh  five  hundred  pounds.  It 
doesn't  matter  to  a  woman  what  a  man's  saying 
or  doing,  or  whether  he's  so  much  cleverer  than 
she  is,  if  she  knows  that  under  everything  he's 
saying,  'I  love  you.'  A  man  isn't  that  way,  but 
a  woman  is.  Now  go."  Again  she  pushed  him 
with  a  small,  brown  hand. 

"What  a  girl  you  are !"  he  said  admiringly. 

"Then  be  a  father  to  me,"  she  said  teasingly. 

[138] 


A      WOMANS      WAY      TO      KNOWLEDGE 

"I  can't  marry  both  your  mother  and  nurse." 

"P'r'aps  you  can't  marry  either,"  she  replied 
sarcastically,  "and  I  know  that  in  any  case  you'll 
never  be  any  relative  of  mine  by  marriage.  Get 
going!"  she  said  almost  impatiently. 

He  turned  to  go,  and  she  said  after  him,  as 
he  rolled  away:  "I'll  let  you  hear  some  of  my 
verses  one  day  when  you're  older  and  can  bear 
them  and  understand  them." 

"I'll  bet  they  beat  mine,"  he  called  back. 

"You'll  win  your  bet,"  she  answered,  and 
stood  leaning  against  a  tree  with  a  look  that  re- 
quired interpretation  emerging  and  receding  in 
her  eyes.  When  he  had  disappeared,  sitting 
down,  she  drew  from  her  breast  a  slip  of  paper, 
unfolded  it,  and  laid  it  on  her  knee.  "It  is  bet- 
ter," she  said.  "It's  not  good  poetry,  of  course, 
but  it's  truer,  and  it's  not  done  according  to  a 
pattern  like  his.  Yes,  it's  real,  real,  real,  and 
he'll  never  see  it — never  see  it  now,  for  I've 
fought  it  all  out,  and  I've  won." 

Then  she  slowly  read  the  verses  aloud. 

"Yes,  I've  won,"  she  said  with  determination. 
So  many  of  her  sex  have  said  things  just  as  de- 
cisively, and  while  yet  the  exhilaration  of  their 
decision  was  inflaming  them,  have  done  what  they 

[139] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

said  they  would  never,  never,  never  do.  Still 
there  was  a  look  in  the  fair  face  which  meant  a 
new  force  awakened  in  her  character. 

For  a  long  time  she  sat  brooding,  forgetful  of 
the  present  and  of  the  little  comedy  of  elderly 
lovers  going  on  inside  the  house.  She  was  think- 
ing of  the  way  conventions  hold  and  bind  us;  of 
the  lack  of  freedom  in  the  lives  of  all,  unless 
they  live  in  wild  places  beyond  the  social  pale. 
Within  the  past  few  weeks  she  had  had  visions 
of  such  a  world  beyond  this  active  and  ordered 
civilisation,  where  the  will  and  the  conscience  of 
a  man  or  woman  was  the  only  law.  She  was  not 
lawless  in  mind  or  spirit.  She  was  only  rebell- 
ing against  a  situation  in  which  she  was  bound 
hand  and  foot,  and  could  not  follow  her  honest 
and  exclusive  desire,  if  she  wished  to  do  so. 

Here  was  a  man  who  was  married,  yet  in  a 
real  sense  he  had  no  wife.  Suppose  that  man 
cared  for  her,  what  a  tragedy  it  would  be  for 
them  to  be  kept  apart!  This  man  did  not  love 
her ;  and  so  there  was  no  tragedy  for  both ;  yet  all 
was  not  over  yet — yes,  all  was  "over  and  over 
and  over,"  she  said  to  herself  as  she  sprang  to  her 
feet  with  a  sharp  exclamation  of  disgust — with 
herself. 

[140] 


A      WOMAN      S      WAY      TO      KNOWLEDGE 

Her  mother  was  coming  hurriedly  towards  her 
from  the  house.  There  was  a  quickness  in  hei 
walk  suggesting  excitement,  yet  from  the  look 
in  her  face  it  was  plain  that  the  news  she  brought 
was  not  painful. 

"He  told  me  you  were  here,  and — " 

"Who  told  you  I  was  here?" 

"Mr.  Bulrush." 

"So  it's  all  settled,"  she  said  with  a  little  quirk 
of  her  shoulders. 

"Yes,  he's  asked  her,  and  they're  going  to  be 
married.  It's  enough  to  make  you  die  laughing 
to  see  the  two  middle-aged  doves  cooing  in  there." 

"I  thought  perhaps  it  would  be  you.  He  said 
he  would  like  to  be  a  father  to  me." 

"That  would  prevent  me  if  nothing  else 
would,"  answered  the  widow  of  Tyndall  Tynan. 
"A  stepfather  to  an  unmarried  girl — both  eying 
each  other  for  a  chance  to  find  fault — if  you 
please,  no  thank  you!" 

"That  means  you  won't  get  married  till  I'm 
out  of  the  way?"  asked  Kitty  with  a  look  which 
was  as  much  touched  with  myrrh  as  with  mirth. 

"It  means  I  wouldn't  get  married  till  you  are 
married,  anyway,"  was  the  complacent  answer. 

"Is  there  any  one  special  that — " 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"Don't  talk  nonsense.  Since  your  father  died 
I've  thought  only  of  his  child  and  mine,  and  I've 
not  looked  where  I  might.  Instead,  I've  done  my 
best  to  prove  that  two  women  could  live  and  suc- 
ceed without  a  man  to  earn  for  them;  though  of 
course  without  the  pension  it  couldn't  have  been 
done  in  the  style  we've  done  it.  We've  got  our 
place!" 

There  is  a  dignity  attached  to  a  pension  which 
has  an  influence  quite  its  own,  and  in  the  most 
primitive  communities  it  has  an  aristocratic  char- 
acter which  commands  general  respect.  In  Aska- 
toon  people  gave  Mrs.  Tynan  a  better  place  so- 
cially because  of  her  pension  than  they  would 
have  done  if  she  had  earned  double  the  money 
which  the  pension  brought  her. 

"Everybody  has  called  on  us,"  she  added  with 
reflective  pride. 

"Principally  since  Mr.  Crozier  came,"  added 
Kitty.  "It's  funny,  isn't  it,  how  he  made  people 
respect  him  before  they  knew  who  he  was1?" 

"He  would  make  Satan  stand  up  and  take  off 
his  hat,  if  he  paid  Hades  a  visit,"  said  Mrs.  Ty- 
nan admiringly.  "Anybody'd  do  anything  for 
him." 

Kitty  eyed  her  mother  closely.     There  was  a 

[142] 


A      WOMAN      S      WAY      TO      KNOWLEDGE 

strange,  far-away,  brooding  look  in  Mrs.  Ty- 
nan's eyes,  and  she  seemed  for  a  moment  lost  in 
thought. 

"You're  in  love  with  him,"  said  Kitty  sharply. 

"I  was,  in  a  way,"  answered  her  mother 
frankly.  "I  was,  in  a  way — a  kind  of  way,  till 
I  knew  he  was  married.  But  it  didn't  mean  any- 
thing. I  never  thought  of  it  except  as  a  thing 
that  couldn't  be." 

"Why  couldn't  it  be4?"  asked  Kitty,  smother- 
ing an  agitation  rising  in  her  breast. 

"Because  I  always  knew  he  belonged  to  where 
we  didn't,  and  because  if  he  was  going  to  be  in 
love  himself  it  would  be  with  some  girl  like  you. 
He's  young  enough  for  that,  and  it's  natural  he 
should  get  as  his  profit  the  years  of  youth  that 
i  young  woman  has  yet  to  live." 

"As  though  it  was  a  choice  between  you  and 
me,  for  instance!" 

Mrs.  Tynan  started,  but  recovered  herself. 
"Yes.  If  there  had  been  any  choosing,  he'd  not 
have  hesitated  a  minute.  He'd  have  taken  you, 
of  course.  But  he  never  gave  either  of  us  a 
thought  that  way." 

"I  thought  that  till — till  after  he'd  told  us  his 
story,"  replied  Kitty  boldly. 

[143] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"What  has  happened  since  then'?"  asked  her 
mother  with  sudden  apprehension. 

"Nothing  has  happened  since.  I  don't  under- 
stand it,  but  it's  as  though  he'd  been  asleep  for 
a  long  time  and  was  awake  again." 

Mrs.  Tynan  gravely  regarded  her  daughter, 
and  a  look  of  fear  came  into  her  face.  "I  knew 
you  kept  thinking  of  him  always,"  she  said;  "but 
you  had  such  sense,  and  he  never  showed  any  feel- 
ing for  you — and  young  girls  get  over  things. 
Besides,  you  always  showed  you  knew  he  wasn't 
a  possibility.  But  since  he  told  us  that  day 
about  his  being  married  and  all,  has — has  he  been 
different  towards  you4?" 

"Not  a  thing,  not  a  word,"  was  the  reply; 
"but — but  there's  a  difference  with  him  in  a 
way.  I  feel  it  when  I  go  in  the  room  where  he 
is." 

"You've  got  to  stop  thinking  of  him,"  insisted 
the  elder  woman  querulously.  "You've  got  to 
stop  it  at  once.  It's  no  good.  It's  bad  for  you. 
You've  too  much  sense  to  go  on  caring  for  a  man 
that—" 

"I'm  going  to  get  married,"  said  Kitty  firmly. 
"I've  made  up  my  mind.  If  you  have  to  think 
about  one  person,  you  should  stop  thinking  about 
[  144] 


A      WOMANS      WAY      TO      KNOWLEDGE 

another;  anyhow,  you've  got  to  make  yourself 
stop.  So  I'm  going  to  marry — and  stop." 

"Who  are  you  going  to  marry,  Kitty?  You 
don't  mean  to  say  it's  John  Sibley!" 

"P'r'aps.     He  keeps  coming." 

"That  gambling  and  racing  fellow !" 

"He  owns  a  big  farm,  and  it  pays,  and  he 
has  got  an  interest  in  a  mine,  and — " 

"I  tell  you,  you  sha'n't,"  peevishly  interjected 
Mrs.  Tynan.  "You  sha'n't.  He's  vicious.  He's 
vicious.  He's — oh,  you  sha'n't!  I'd  rather — " 

"You'd  rather  I  threw  myself  away — on  a  mar- 
ried man?"  asked  Kitty  covertly. 

"My  God — oh,  Kitty!"  said  the  other,  break- 
ing down.  "You  can't  mean  it — oh,  you  can't 
mean  that  you'd — " 

"I've  got  to  work  out  my  case  in  my  own  way," 
broke  in  Kitty  calmly.  "I  know  how  I've  got  to 
do  it.  I  have  to  make  my  own  medicine — and 
take  it.  You  say  John  Sibley  is  vicious.  He 
has  only  got  one  vice." 

"Isn't  it  enough?     Gambling — " 

"That  isn't  a  vice;  it's  a  sport.     It's  the  same 

as  Mr.  Crozier  had.     Mr.  Crozier  did  it  with 

horses  only,   the   other  does   it  with  cards  and 

horses.     The  only  vice  John  Sibley's  got  is  me." 

[145] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

"Is  you*?"  asked  her  mother  bewilderedly. 

"Well,  when  you've  got  an  idea  you  can't  con- 
trol and  it  makes  you  its  slave,  it's  a  vice.  I'm 
John's  vice,  and  I'm  thinking  of  trying  to  cure 
him  of  it — and  cure  myself,  too,"  Kitty  added, 
folding  and  unfolding  the  paper  in  her  hand. 

"Here  comes  the  Young  Doctor,"  said  her 
mother,  turning  towards  the  house.  "I  think 
you  don't  mean  to  marry  Sibley,  but  if  you  do, 
make  him  give  up  gambling." 

"I  don't  know  that  I  want  him  to  give  it  up," 
answered  Kitty  musingly. 

A  moment  later  she  was  alone  with  the  Young 
Doctor. 


[H6] 


CHAPTER  VIII 

ALL   ABOUT   AN   UNOPENED 
LETTER 


"TY  THAT'S  this  you've  been  doing?"  asked 

VV  the  Young  Doctor,  with  a  quizzical 
smile.  "We  never  can  tell  where  you'll  break 
out." 

"Kitty  Tynan's  measles!"  she  rejoined,  swing- 
ing her  hat  by  its  ribbon.  "Mine  isn't  a  one- 
sided character,  is  it?" 

"I  know  one  of  the  sides  quite  well,"  returned 
the  Young  Doctor. 

"Which,  please,  sir?" 

The  Young  Doctor  pretended  to  look  wise. 
"The  outside.  I  read  it  like  a  book.  It  fits  the 
life  in  which  it  moves  like  the  paper  on  the  wall. 
But  I'm  not  sure  of  the  inside.  In  fact,  I  don't 
think  I  know  that  at  all." 

[147] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"So  I  couldn't  call  you  in  if  my  character  was 
sick  inside,  could  I?"  she  asked  obliquely. 

"I  might  have  an  operation  and  see  what's 
wrong  with  it,"  he  answered  playfully. 

Suddenly  she  shivered.  "I've  had  enough  of 
operations  to  last  me  a  while,"  she  rejoined.  "I 
thought  I  could  stand  anything,  but  your  opera- 
tion on  Mr.  Crozier  taught  me  a  lesson.  I'd 
never  be  a  doctor's  wife  if  I  had  to  help  him  cut 
up  human  beings." 

"I'll  remember  that,"  the  Young  Doctor  re- 
plied mockingly. 

"But  if  it  would  help  put  things  on  a  right 
basis,  I'd  make  a  bargain  that  I  wasn't  to  help 
do  the  carving,"  she  rejoined  wickedly.  The 
Young  Doctor  always  incited  her  to  say  daring 
things.  They  understood  each  other  well.  "So 
don't  let  that  stand  in  the  way,"  she  added  slyly. 

"The  man  that  gets  you  will  be  glad  to  get 
you  without  the  anatomy,"  he  returned  gallantly. 

"I  wasn't  talking  of  a  man;  I  was  talking  of 
a  doctor." 

He  threw  up  a  hand  and  his  eyebrows.  "Isn't 
a  doctor  a  man*?" 

"Those  I've  seen  have  been  mostly  fish." 


"No  feelings— eh?" 


[148] 


ABOUT     AN      UNOPENED      LETTER 

She  looked  him  in  the  eyes  and  he  felt  a  kind 
of  shiver  go  through  him.  "Not  enough  to  no- 
tice— I  never  observed  you  had  any,"  she  replied. 
"If  I  saw  that  you  had,  I'd  be  so  frightened  I'd 
fly.  I've  seen  pictures  of  an  excited  whale  turn- 
ing a  boat  full  of  men  over.  No,  I  couldn't  bear 
to  see  you  show  any  feeling." 

The  dark  eyes  of  the  Young  Doctor  suddenly 
took  on  a  look  which  was  a  stranger  to  them.  In 
his  relations  with  women  he  was  singularly  im- 
personal, but  he  was  a  man,  and  he  was  young 
enough  to  feel  the  Adam  stir  in  him.  The  hid- 
den or  controlled  thing  suddenly  emerged.  It 
was  not  the  look  which  would  be  in  his  eyes  if 
he  were  speaking  to  the  woman  he  wanted  to 
marry.  Kitty  saw  it  and  she  did  not  understand 
it,  for  she  had  at  heart  a  feeling  that  she  could 
go  to  him  in  any  trouble  of  life  and  be  sure  of 
healing.  To  her  he  seemed  wonderful;  but  she 
thought  of  him  as  she  would  have  thought  of  her 
father,  as  a  person  of  authority  and  knowledge — 
that  operation  showed  him  a  great  man,  she 
thought,  so  skilful  and  precise  and  splendid;  and 
the  whole  countryside  had  such  confidence  in  him. 

She  regarded  him  as  a  being  apart;  but  for  a 
moment,  an  ominous  moment,  he  was  almost  one 

[149] 


with  that  race  of  men  who  feed  in  strange  pas- 
tures. She  only  half  saw  the  reddish  glow  which 
came  swimming  into  his  eyes,  and  she  did  not 
realise  it,  for  she  did  not  expect  to  find  it  there. 
For  an  instant,  however,  he  saw  with  new  eyes 
that  primary  eloquence  of  woman  life,  the  un- 
spent splendour  of  youth,  the  warm  joy  of  the  ma- 
terial being,  the  mystery  of  maidenhood  in  all 
its  efflorescence.  It  was  the  emergence  of  his 
own  youth  again,  as  why  should  it  not,  since  he 
had  never  married  and  had  never  dallied!  But 
in  a  moment  it  was  gone  again — driven  away. 

"What  a  wicked  little  flirt  you  are!"  he  said, 
with  a  shake  of  the  head.  "You'll  come  to  a 
bad  end,  if  you  don't  change  your  ways." 

"Perform  an  operation,  then,  if  you  think  you 
know  what's  the  matter  with  me,"  she  retorted. 

"Sometimes  in  operating  for  one  disease  we 
come  on  another,  and  then  there's  a  lot  of  think- 
ing to  be  done,"  he  suggested. 

The  look  in  her  face  was  quizzical,  yet  there 
was  a  strange,  elusive  gravity  in  her  eyes,  an  al- 
most pathetic  appealing.  "If  you  were  going  to 
operate  on  me  what  would  it  be  for1?"  she  asked 
more  flippantly  than  her  face  showed. 

"Well,  it's  obscure,  and  the  symptoms  are  not 
[150] 


ABOUT     AN      UNOPENED      LETTER 

usual,  but  I  should  strike  for  the  cancer  love," 
he  answered,  with  a  direct  look. 

She  flushed  and  changed  on  the  instant.  "Is 
love  a  cancer?"  she  asked.  All  at  once  she  felt 
sure  that  he  read  her  real  story,  and  something 
very  like  anger  quickened  in  her. 

"Unrequited  love  is,"  he  answered  deliberately. 

"How  do  you  know  it  is  unrequited1?"  she 
asked  sharply. 

"Well,  I  don't  know  it,"  he  answered,  dis- 
mayed by  the  look  in  her  face.  "But  I  certainly 
hope  I'm  right.  I  do,  indeed." 

"And  if  you  were  right  what  would  you  do — 
as  a  surgeon?"  she  questioned  with  an  undertone 
of  meaning. 

"I  would  remove  the  cause  of  the  disease." 

She  came  close  and  looked  him  straight  in  the 
eyes.  "You  mean  that  he  should  go?  You 
think  that  would  cure  the  disease?  Well,  you 
are  not  going  to  interfere.  You  are  not  going  to 
manoeuvre  anything  to  get  him  away — I  know 
doctor's  tricks.  You'd  say  he  must  go  away  east 
or  west  to  the  sea  for  change  of  air  to  get  well. 
That's  nonsense,  and  it  isn't  necessary.  You  are 
absolutely  wrong  in  your  diagnosis — if  that's 
what  you  call  it.  He  is  going  to  stay  here. 

[151] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

You  aren't  going  to  drive  away  one  of  our  board- 
ers and  take  the  bread  out  of  our  mouths.  Any- 
how, you're  wrong.  You  think  because  a  girl 
worships  a  man's  ability  that  she's  in  love  with 
him.  I  adore  your  ability,  but  I'd  as  soon  fall 
in  love  with  a  lobster — and  be  boiled  with  the 
lobster  in  a  black  pot.  Such  conceit  men  have !" 

He  was  not  convinced.  He  had  a  deep-seeing 
eye,  and  he  saw  that  she  was  boldly  trying  to  di- 
vert his  belief  or  suspicion.  He  respected  her 
for  it.  He  might  have  said  he  loved  her  for  it — 
with  a  kind  of  love  which  can  be  spoken  of  with- 
out blushing  or  giving  cause  to  blush,  or  reason 
for  jealousy,  anger  or  apprehension. 

He  smiled  down  into  her  gold-brown  eyes  and 
he  thought  what  a  real  woman  she  was.  He  felt, 
too,  that  she  would  tell  him  something  that  would 
give  him  further  light  if  he  spoke  wisely  now. 

"I'd  like  to  see  some  proof  that  you  are  right, 
if  I  am  wrong,"  he  answered  cautiously. 

"Well,  I'm  going  to  be  married,"  she  said  with 
an  air  of  finality. 

He  waved  a  hand  deprecatingly.  "Impossible 
—there's  no  man  worth  it.  Who  is  the  undeserv- 
ing wretch4?" 

"I'll  tell  you  to-morrow,"  she  replied.     "He 

[152] 


ABOUT      AN      UNOPENED      LETTER 

doesn't  know  yet  how  happy  he's  going  to  be. 
What  did  you  come  here  for*?  Why  did  you 
want  to  see  me?"  she  added.  "You  had  some- 
thing you  were  going  to  tell  me.  Hadn't  you1?" 

"That's  quite  right,"  he  replied.  "It's  about 
Crozier.  This  is  my  last  visit  to  him  profession- 
ally. He  can  go  on  now  without  my  care — 
yours  will  be  sufficient  for  him.  It  has  been  all 
along  the  very  best  care  he  could  have  had.  It 
did  more  for  him  than  all  the  rest,  it — " 

"You  don't  mean  that,"  she  interrupted,  with 
a  flush  and  a  bosom  that  leaped  under  her  pretty 
gown.  "You  don't  mean  that  I  was  of  more  use 
than  the  nurse — than  the  future  Mrs.  Jesse  Bul- 
rush?' 

"I  mean  just  that,"  he  answered.  "Nearly 
every  sick  person,  every  sick  man,  I  should  say, 
has  his  mascot,  his  ministering  angel,  as  it  were. 
It's  a  kind  of  obsession,  and  it  often  means  life 
or  death,  whether  the  mascot  can  stand  the  strain 
of  the  situation.  I  knew  an  old  man — down  by 
Dingley's  Flat  it  was,  and  he  wanted  a  boy — his 
grand-nephew — beside  him  always.  He  was  get- 
ting well,  but  the  boy  took  sick  and  the  old  man 
died  the  next  day.  The  boy  had  been  his  medi- 
cine. Sometimes  it's  a  particular  nurse  that  does 

[153] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

the  trick;  but  whoever  it  is,  it's  a  great  vital  fact. 
Well,  that's  the  part  you  played  to  Mr.  Shiel 
Crozier  of  Lammis  and  Castlegarry  aforetime. 
He  owes  you  much." 

"I  am  glad  of  that,"  she  said  softly,  her  eyes 
on  the  distance. 

"She  is  in  love  with  him  in  spite  of  what  she 
says,"  remarked  the  Young  Doctor  to  himself. 
"Well,"  he  continued  aloud,  "the  fact  is,  Cro- 
zier's  almost  well  in  a  way,  but  his  mind  is  in  a 
state,  and  he  is  not  going  to  get  wholly  right  as 
things  are.  Since  things  came  out  in  court,  since 
he  told  us  his  whole  story,  he  has  been  different. 
It's  as  though — " 

She  interrupted  him  hastily  and  with  sup- 
pressed emotion.  "Yes,  yes,  do  you  think  I've 
not  noticed  that1?  He's  been  asleep  in  a  way  for 
five  years,  and  now  he's  awake  again.  He  is 
not  James  Gathorne  Kerry  now;  he  is  James 
Shiel  Gathorne  Crozier,  and — oh,  you  under- 
stand: he's  back  again  where  he  was  before — be- 
fore he  left  her!" 

The     Young     Doctor     nodded     approvingly. 
"What  a  little  brazen  wonder  you  are!     I  de- 
clare you  see  more  than — " 
[154] 


ABOUT     AN      UNOPENED      LETTER 

"Yet  you  won't  have  me*?"  she  asked  mock- 
ingly. 

"You're  too  clever  for  me,"  he  rejoined  with 
spirit.  "I'm  too  conceited.  I  must  marry  a  girl 
that'd  kneel  to  me  and  think  me  as  wise  as  Socra- 
tes. But  he's  back  again,  as  you  say,  and,  in 
my  view  his  wife  ought  to  be  back  again  also." 

"She  ought  to  be  here"  was  Kitty's  swift  re- 
ply, "though  I  think  mighty  little  of  her — mighty 
little,  I  can  tell  you.  Stuck-up,  great  tall  stork 
of  a  woman,  that  lords  it  over  a  man  as  though 
she  was  a  goddess.  Wears  diamonds  in  the  mid- 
dle of  the  day,  I  suppose,  and  cold-blooded  as — 
as  a  fish." 

"She  ought  to  have  married  me,  according  to 
your  opinion  of  me.  You  said  I  was  a  fish,"  re- 
marked the  Young  Doctor,  with  a  laugh. 

"The  whale  and  the  catfish !" 

"Heavens,  what  spite!"  he  rejoined.  "Cat- 
fish— what  do  you  know  about  Mrs.  Crozier'? 
You  may  be  brutally  unjust — waspishly  unjust, 
I  should  say." 

"Do  I  look  like  a  wasp?"  she  asked  half  tear- 
fully. She  was  in  a  strange  mood. 

"You  look  like  a  golden  busy  bee,"  he  an- 

[155] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

swered.  "But  tell  me,  how  did  you  come  to 
know  enough  about  her  to  call  her  a  cat1?" 

"Because,  as  you  say,  I  was  a  busy  golden 
bee,"  she  retorted. 

"That  information  doesn't  get  me  much  fur- 
ther," he  answered. 

"I  opened  that  letter"  she  replied. 

"  'That  letter' — you  mean  you  opened  the  let- 
ter he  showed  us  which  he  had  left  sealed  as  it 
came  to  him  five  years  ago4?"  The  Young  Doc- 
tor's face  wore  a  look  of  tiouble  and  dismay. 

"I  steamed  the  envelope  open — how  else  could 
I  have  done  it!  I  steamed  it  open,  saw  what  I 
wanted,  and  closed  it  up  again." 

The  Young  Doctor's  face  was  pale  now.  This 
was  a  terrible  revelation.  He  had  a  man's  view 
of  such  conduct.  He  almost  shrank  from  her, 
though  she  stood  there  as  inviting  and  pretty  and 
innocent  a  specimen  of  girlhood  as  the  eye  could 
wish  to  see.  She  did  not  look  dishonourable. 

"Do  you  realise  what  that  means'?"  he  asked  in 
a  cold,  hard  tone. 

"Oh,  come,  don't  put  on  that  look  and  don't 
talk  like  John  the  Evangelist!"  she  retorted.  "I 
did  it,  not  out  of  curiosity,  and  not  to  do  any  one 
harm,  but  to  do  her  good — his  wife." 

[156] 


ABOUT     AN      UNOPENED      LETTER 

"It  was  dishonourable — wicked  and  dis- 
honourable." 

"If  you  talk  like  that,  Mr.  Piety,  I'm  off,"  she 
rejoined,  and  she  started  away. 

"Wait — wait,"  he  said,  laying  firm  fingers  on 
her  arm.  "Of  course  you  did  it  for  a  good  pur- 
pose. I  know.  You  cared  enough  for  him  for 
that." 

He  had  said  the  right  thing,  and  she  halted  and 
faced  him.  "I  cared  enough  to  do  a  good  deal 
more  than  that  if  necessary.  He  has  been  like 
a  second  father  to  me,  and — " 

Suddenly  a  light  of  humour  shot  into  the  eyes 
of  both.  Shiel  Crozier  as  a  "father"  to  her  was 
too  gaily  artificial  not  to  provoke  their  natural 
sense  of  the  grotesque. 

"I  wanted  to  find  out  his  wife's  address  to  write 
to  her  and  tell  her  to  come  quick,"  she  ex- 
plained. "It  was  when  he  was  at  the  worst. 
And  then,  too,  I  wanted  to  know  the  kind  of 
woman  she  was  before  I  wrote  to  her.  So — " 

"You  mean  to  say  you  read  that  letter 
which  he  had  kept  unopened  and  unread  for  five 
long  years  *?"  The  Young  Doctor  was  certainly 
shocked  and  disturbed  again. 

"Every  word  of  it,"  Kitty  answered  shame- 
[157] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

lessly,  "and  I'm  not  sorry.  It  was  in  a  good 
cause.  If  he  had  said  'Courage,  soldier,'  and 
opened  it  five  years  ago,  it  would  have  been  good 
for  him.  Better  to  get  things  like  that  over." 

"It  was  that  kind  of  a  letter,  was  it — a  catfish 
letter?' 

Kitty  laughed  a  little  scornfully.  "Yes,  just 
like  that,  Mr.  Easily  Shocked.  Great,  showy, 
purse-proud  creature !" 

"And  you  wrote  to  her*?" 

"Yes,  a  letter  that  would  make  her  come  if 
anything  would.  Talk  of  tact,  I  was  as  smooth 
as  a  billiard-ball.  But  she  hasn't  come." 

"The  day  after  the  operation  I  cabled  to  her," 
said  the  Young  Doctor. 

"Then  you  steamed  the  letter  open  and  read 
it,  too*?"  asked  Kitty  sarcastically. 

"Certainly  not.  Ladies  first — and  last,"  was 
the  equally  sarcastic  answer.  "I  cabled  to  Cas- 
tlegarry,  his  father's  place,  also  to  Lammis  that 
he  mentioned  when  he  told  us  his  story — Crozier 
of  Lammis,  he  was." 

"Well,  I  wrote  to  the  London  address  in  the 
letter,"  added  Kitty.     "I  don't  think  she'll  come. 
I  asked  her  to  cable  me,  and  she  hasn't.     I  wrote 
such  a  nice  letter,  too.     I  did  it  for  his  sake." 
[158] 


ABOUT     AN      UNOPENED      LETTER 

The  Young  Doctor  laid  his  hands  on  both  her 
shoulders.  "Kitty  Tynan,  the  man  who  gets 
you  will  get  what  he  doesn't  deserve,"  he  re- 
marked. 

"That  might  mean  anything,"  she  answered. 

"It  means  that  he  owes  you  more  than  he  can 
guess." 

Her  eyes  shone  with  a  strange,  soft  glow. 
"In  spite  of  opening  the  letter1?" 

The  Young  Doctor  nodded,  then  added  hu- 
morously: "That  letter  you  wrote  her — I'm 
not  sure  that  my  cable  wouldn't  have  far  more 
effect  than  your  letter." 

"Certainly  not.  You  tried  to  frighten  her, 
but  I  tried  to  coax  her — to  make  her  feel 
ashamed.  I  wrote  as  though  I  was  fifty." 

The  Young  Doctor  regarded  her  quizzically 
and  even  dubiously.  "What  was  the  sort  of 
thing  you  said  to  her  9" 

"For  one  thing,  I  said  that  he  had  every  com- 
fort and  attention  two  loving  women  and  one 
fond  nurse  could  give  him;  but  that,  of  course, 
his  legitimate  wife  would  naturally  be  glad  to 
be  beside  him  when  he  passed  away,  and  that 
if  she  made  haste  she  might  be  here  in 
time." 

[159] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

The  Young  Doctor  leaned  against  a  tree  shak- 
ing with  laughter. 

"What  are  you  smiling  at1?"  Kitty  asked 
ironically. 

"Oh,  she'll  be  sure  to  come — nothing  will  keep 
her  away  after  being  coaxed  like  that!"  he  said 
when  he  could  get  breath. 

"Laughing  at  me  as  though  I  was  a  clown  in 
a  circus!"  she  exclaimed.  "Laughing  when,  as 
you  say  yourself,  the  man  that  she — the  cat — 
wrote  that  fiendish  letter  to  is  in  trouble." 

"It  was  a  fiendish  letter,  was  it*?"  he  asked, 
suddenly  sobered  again.  "No,  no,  don't  tell 
me,"  he  added  with  a  protesting  gesture.  "I 
don't  want  to  hear.  I  don't  want  to  know.  I 
oughtn't  to  know.  Besides,  if  she  comes,  I  don't 
want  to  be  prejudiced  against  her.  He  is  trou- 
bled, poor  fellow." 

"Of  course  he  is.  There's  the  big  land  deal — 
his  syndicate.  He's  got  a  chance  of  making  a 
fortune,  and  he  can't  do  it  because — but  Jesse 
Bulrush  told  me  in  confidence,  so  I  can't  ex- 
plain." 

"I  have  an  idea,  a  pretty  good  idea — Askatoon 
is  small." 

"And  mean  sometimes." 

[160] 


ABOUT     AN      UNOPENED      LETTER 

"Tell  me  what  you  know.  Perhaps  I  can 
help  him,"  urged  the  Young  Doctor.  "I  have 
helped  more  than  one  good  man  turn  a  sharp 
corner  here." 

She  caught  his  arm.  "You  are  as  good  as 
gold,"  she  said. 

"You  are — impossible,"  he  replied. 

They  talked  of  Crozier's  land  deal  and  syn- 
dicate as  they  walked  slowly  towards  the  house. 
Mrs.  Tynan  met  them  at  the  door,  a  look  of  ex- 
citement in  her  face. 

"A  telegram  for  you,  Kitty,"  she  said. 

"For  me!"  exclaimed  Kitty  eagerly.  "It's 
a  year  since  I  had  one." 

j 

She  tore  open  the  yellow  envelope.  A  light 
shot  up  in  her  face.  She  thrust  the  telegram 
into  the  Young  Doctor's  hands. 

"She's  coming;  his  wife's  coming — she's  in 
Quebec  now.  It  was  my  letter — my  letter,  not 
your  cable,  that  brought  her,"  Kitty  added  tri- 
umphantly. 


[161] 


CHAPTER  IX 

NIGHT   SHADE   AND 
MORNING   GLORY 


IT  was  as  though  Crozier  had  been  told  of 
the  coming  of  his  wife,  for  when  night  came, 
on  the  day  Kitty  had  received  her  telegram,  he 
could  not  sleep.  He  was  the  sport  of  a  consum- 
ing restlessness.  His  brain  would  not  be  still. 
He  could  not  discharge  from  it  the  thoughts  of 
the  day  and  make  it  vacuous.  It  would  not  re- 
lax. It  seized  with  intentness  on  each  thing  in 
turn  which  was  part  of  his  life  at  the  moment 
and  gave  it  an  abnormal  significance.  In  vain 
he  tried  to  shake  himself  free  of  the  successive 
obsessions  which  stormed  down  the  path  of  the 
night,  dragging  him  after  them,  a  slave  lashed 
to  the  wheels  of  a  chariot  of  flame. 

Now  it  was  the  great  land  deal  and  syndicate 
on  which  his  future  depended,  and  the  savage 
[162] 


NIGHT      SHADE 


fate  which  seemed  about  to  snatch  his  fortune 
away  as  it  had  done  so  often  before;  as  it  had 
done  on  the  day  when  Flamingo  went  down  near 
the  post  at  the  Derby  with  a  madwoman  drag- 
ging at  the  bridle.  He  had  had  a  sure  thing 
then,  and  it  was  whisked  away  just  when  it 
would  have  enabled  him  to  pass  the  crisis  of  his 
life.  Wife,  home,  the  old  fascinating,  crowded 
life — they  had  all  vanished  because  of  that  vile 
trick  of  destiny;  and  ever  since  then  he  had 
been  wandering  in  the  wilderness  through  years 
that  brought  no  fruit  of  his  labours.  Yet  here 
was  his  chance,  his  great  chance  to  get  back  what 
he  had  and  was  in  the  old  misspent  days,  with 
new  purposes  in  life  to  follow  and  serve;  and  it 
was  all  in  cruel  danger  of  being  swept  away 
when  almost  within  his  grasp. 

If  he  could  but  achieve  the  big  deal,  he  could 
return  to  wife  and  home,  he  could  be  master  in 
his  own  house,  not  a  dependent  on  his  wife's 
bounty.  That  very  evening  Jesse  Bulrush, 
elated  by  his  own  good  fortune  in  capturing 
Cupid,  had  told  him  as  sadly  as  was  possible, 
while  his  own  fortunes  were,  as  he  thought,  soar- 
ing, that  every  avenue  of  credit  seemed  closed, 
that  neither  bank  nor  money-lender,  trust  or  loan 

[163] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

company,  would  let  him  have  the  ten  thousand 
dollars  necessary  for  him  to  hold  his  place  in  the 
syndicate;  while  each  of  the  other  members  of 
the  clique  had  flatly  and  cheerfully  refused,  say- 
ing they  had  all  they  could  carry  as  it  was.  Cro- 
zier  had  commanded  Jesse  not  to  approach  them, 
but  the  fat  sentimentalist  had  an  idea  that  his 
tongue  had  a  gift  of  wheedling,  and  he  believed 
that  he  could  make  them  "shell  out,"  as  he  put 
it.  He  had  failed,  and  he  was  obliged  to  say 
so,  when  Crozier,  suspecting,  brought  him  to 
book. 

"They  mean  to  crowd  you  out — that's  their 
game,"  Bulrush  had  said.  "They've  closed  up 
all  the  ways  to  cash  or  credit.  They  mean  to  do 
you  out  of  your  share.  Unless  you  put  up  the 
cash  within  the  four  days  left  they'll  put  it 
through  without  you.  They  told  me  to  tell  you 
that." 

And  Crozier  had  not  even  cursed  them.  He 
said  to  Jesse  Bulrush  that  it  was  an  old  game  to 
get  hold  of  a  patent  that  made  a  fortune  for  a 
song  while  the  patentee  died  in  the  poor-house. 
Yet  that  four  days  was  time  enough  for  a  live 
man  to  do  a  "flurry  of  work,"  and  he  was  fit 
enough  to  walk  up  their  backs  yet  with  hobnailed 
[164] 


NIGHT      SHADE 


boots,  as  they  said  in  Kerry  when  a  man  was  out 
for  war. 

Over  and  over  again  this  hovering  tragedy 
drove  sleep  from  his  eyes;  and  in  the  spaces  be- 
tween there  were  a  hundred  fleeting  visions  of  lit- 
tle and  big  things  to  torture  him — remembrances 
of  incidents  when  debts  and  disasters  dogged  his 
footsteps;  and  behind  them  all,  floating  among 
the  elves  and  gnomes  of  ill-luck  and  disappoint- 
ment, was  a  woman's  face.  It  was  not  his  wife's 
face,  not  a  face  that  belonged  to  the  old  life,  but 
one  which  had  been  part  of  his  daily  existence 
for  over  four  years.  It  was  the  first  face  he  saw 
when  he  came  back  from  consciousness  after  the 
operation  which  saved  his  life — the  face  of  Kitty 
Tynan. 

And  ever  since  the  day  when  he  had  told  the 
story  of  his  life  this  face  had  kept  passing  before 
his  eyes  with  a  disturbing  persistence.  Kitty 
had  said  to  her  mother  and  to  the  Young  Doctor 
that  he  had  seemed  like  one  who  had  awakened 
after  he  had  told  his  story;  and  in  a  sense  it  was 
startlingly  true.  It  was  as  though,  while  he  was 
living  under  an  assumed  name,  the  real  James 
Shiel  Gathorne  Crozier  did  not  exist,  or  was  in 
the  far  background  of  the  doings  and  sayings  of 

[165] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

J.  G.  Kerry.  His  wife  and  the  past  had  been 
shadowy  in  a  way,  had  been  as  part  of  a  life 
lived  out,  which  would  return  in  some  distant 
day,  but  was  not  vital  to  the  present.  Much  as 
he  had  loved  his  wife,  the  violent  wrench  away 
from  her  had  seemed  almost  as  complete  as  death 
itself;  but  the  resumption  of  his  own  name  and 
the  telling  of  his  story  had  produced  a  complete 
psychological  change  in  him  mentally  and  bodily. 
The  impersonal  feeling  which  had  marked  his  re- 
lations with  the  two  women  of  this  household, 
and  with  all  women,  was  suddenly  gone.  He 
longed  for  the  arms  of  a  woman  round  his  neck — 
it  was  five  years  since  any  woman's  arms  had 
been  there,  since  he  had  kissed  any  woman's  lips. 
Now  in  the  hour  when  his  fortunes  were  again 
in  the  fatal  balance,  when  he  would  be  started 
again  for  a  fair  race  with  the  wife  from  whom 
he  had  been  so  long  parted,  another  face  came 
between. 

All  at  once  the  question  Burlingame  asked  him 
as  to  whether  his  wife  was  living  came  to  him. 
He  had  never  for  an  instant  thought  of  her  as 
dead,  but  now  a  sharp  and  terrifying  anxiety 
came  to  him.  If  his  wife  was  living!  Living? 
Her  death  had  never  been  even  a  remote  possi- 

[166] 


NIGHT      SHADE 


bility  to  his  mind,  though  the  parting  had  had 
the  decisiveness  of  death.  Beneath  all  his 
shrewdness  and  ability  he  was  at  heart  a  dreamer, 
a  romancist  to  whom  life  was  an  adventure  in  a 
half-real  world. 

It  was  impossible  to  sleep.  He  tossed  from 
side  to  side.  Once  he  got  up  in  the  dark  and 
drank  great  draughts  of  water;  once  again  as  he 
thought  of  Mona,  his  wife,  as  she  was  in  the  first 
days  of  their  married  life,  a  sudden  impulse 
seized  him.  He  sprang  from  his  bed,  lit  a  can- 
dle, went  to  the  desk  where  his  unopened  letter 
lay,  and  took  it  out.  With  the  feeling  that  he 
must  destroy  this  record,  this  unread  but,  as  he 
knew,  ugly  record  of  their  differences,  and  so 
clear  her  memory  of  any  cruelty,  of  any  act  of 
anger,  he  was  about  to  hold  it  to  the  flame  of 
the  candle  when  he  thought  he  heard  a  sound  be- 
hind him  as  of  the  door  of  his  room  gently  clos- 
ing. Laying  the  letter  down,  he  went  to  the 
door  and  opened  it.  There  was  no  one  stirring. 
Yet  he  had  a  feeling  as  though  some  one  was 
there  in  the  darkness.  His  lips  framed  the 
words,  "Who  is  it?  Is  any  one  there?"  but  he 
did  not  utter  them. 

A  kind  of  awe  possessed  him.  He  was  Celtic; 
[167] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

he  had  been  fed  on  the  supernatural  when  he  was 
a  child;  he  had  had  strange,  indefinable  experi- 
ences or  hallucinations  in  the  days  when  he  lived 
at  Castlegarry,  and  all  his  life  he  had  been  a 
friend  of  the  mystical.  It  is  hard  to  tell  what 
he  thought  as  he  stood  there  and  peered  into  the 
darkness  of  the  other  room — the  living-room  of 
the  house.  He  was  in  a  state  of  trance,  almost — 
the  victim  of  the  night.  But  as  he  closed  the 
door  softly  the  words  of  the  song  that  Kitty 
Tynan  had  sung  to  him  the  day  when  he  found 
her  brushing  his  coat  came  to  him  and  flooded  his 
brain.  The  last  two  verses  of  the  song  kept 
drowning  his  sense  of  the  actual,  and  he  was 
swayed  by  the  superstition  of  bygone  ancestors: 

"Whereaway  goes  my  lad — tell  me,  has  he  gone  alone? 

Never  harsh  word  did  I  speak,  never  hurt  I  gave; 
Strong  he  was  and  beautiful;  like  a  heron  he  has  flown — 

Hereaway,  hereaway  will  I  make  my  grave. 

"When  once  more  the  lad  I  loved  hereaway,  hereaway, 
Comes  to  lay  his  hand  in  mine,  kiss  me  on  the  brow, 

I  will  whisper  down  the  wind,  he  will  weep  to  hear  me 

say — 
'Whereaway,  whereaway  goes  my  lover  now !'  " 

[168] 


NIGHT      SHADE 


He  went  to  bed  again,  but  sleep  would  not 
come.  The  verses  of  the  lament  kept  singing  in 
his  brain.  He  tossed  from  side  to  side,  he  sought 
to  control  himself,  but  it  was  of  no  avail.  Sud- 
denly he  remembered  the  bed  of  boughs  he  had 
made  for  himself  at  the  place  where  Kitty  had 
had  her  meeting  with  the  Young  Doctor  the 
previous  day.  Before  he  was  shot  he  used  to 
sleep  in  the  open  in  the  summer  time.  If  he 
could  get  to  sleep  anywhere  it  would  be  there. 

Hastily  dressing  himself  in  flannel  shirt  and 
trousers,  and  dragging  a  blanket  from  the  bed, 
he  found  his  way  to  the  bedroom  door,  went  into 
the  other  room,  and  felt  his  way  to  the  front  door 
which  would  open  into  the  night.  All  at  once 
he  was  conscious  of  another  presence  in  the  room, 
but  the  folk-song  was  still  beating  in  his  brain, 
and  he  reproved  himself  for  succumbing  to  fan- 
tasy. Finding  the  front  door  in  the  dark,  he 
opened  it  and  stepped  outside.  There  was  no 
moon,  but  there  were  millions  of  stars  in  the  blue 
vault  above,  and  there  was  enough  light  for 
him  to  make  his  way  to  the  place  where  he  had 
slept  "hereaway  and  oft." 

He  knew  that  the  bed  of  boughs  would  be  dry, 
[169] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

but  the  night  would  be  his,  and  the  good,  cool 
ground  and  the  soughing  of  the  pines  and  the 
sweet  infinitesimal  and  innumerable  sounds  of  the 
breathing  earth,  itself  asleep.  He  found  the 
place  and  threw  himself  down.  Why,  here  were 
green  boughs  under  him,  not  the  dried  remains 
of  what  he  had  placed  there!  Kitty — it  was 
Kitty,  dear,  gay,  joyous,  kind  Kitty,  who  had 
done  this  thing,  thinking  that  he  might  want  to 
sleep  in  the  open  again  after  his  illness.  Kitty — 
it  was  she  who  had  so  thoughtfully  served  him; 
Kitty,  with  the  instinct  of  true,  unselfish  woman- 
hood, with  the  gift  of  the  outdoor  life,  with  the 
unpurchasable  gift  of  friendship.  What  a  girl 
she  was!  How  rich  she  could  make  the  life  of 
a  man! 

"Hereaway  my  heart  was  soft ;  when  he  kissed  my  happy 

eyes, 
Held  my  hand,  and  laid  his  cheek  warm  against  my 

brow, 
Home  I  saw  upon  the  earth,  heaven  stood  there  in  the 

skies — 
Whereaway,  whereaway  goes  my  lover  now?" 

How  different  she  was,  this  child  of  the  West, 
of  nature,  from  the  woman  he  had  left  behind 
in    England — the    sophisticated,    well-appointed, 
[170] 


NIGHT      SHADE 

well-controlled  girl — too  well-controlled  even  in 
the  first  days  of  married  life — too  well-con- 
trolled for  him  who  had  the  rushing  impulses  of 
a  Celtic  warrier  of  olden  days.  Delicate,  refined, 
perfectly  poised,  and  Kitty  to  her  like  a  sun- 
flower to  a  sprig  of  heliotrope.  Mona — Kitty, 
the  two  names,  the  two  who,  so  far,  had  touched 
his  life,  each  in  her  own  way  as  none  others  had 
done,  they  floated  before  his  eyes  till  sight  and 
feeling  grew  dim.  With  a  last  effort  he  strove 
to  eject  Kitty  from  his  thoughts,  for  there  was 
the  wife  he  had  won  in  the  race  of  life,  and  he 
must  stand  by  her,  play  the  game,  ride  honestly, 
even  in  exile  from  her,  run  straight,  even  with 
that  unopened,  bitter,  upbraiding  letter  in  the — 

He  fell  asleep,  and  soon  and  slowly  and  ever 
so  dimly  the  opal  light  of  the  prairie  dawn  came 
stealing  over  the  landscape.  With  it  came  steal- 
ing the  figure  of  a  girl  towards  the  group  of 
trees  where  lay  the  man  of  Lammis  on  the  bed 
of  green  boughs  which  she  had  renewed  for  him. 
She  had  followed  him  from  the  dark  room  where 
she  had  waited  near  him  through  the  night — near 
him,  to  be  near  him  for  the  last  time;  alone  with 
him  and  the  kind,  holy  night  before  the  morrow 

' 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

came  which  belonged  to  the  other  woman,  who 
had  written  to  him  as  she  never  could  have 
written  to  any  man  in  whose  arms  she  ever  had 
lain.  And  the  pity  and  the  tragedy  of  it  was 
that  he  loved  his  wife — the  catfish  wife.  The 
sharp,  pitiless  instinct  of  love  told  her  that  the 
stirring  in  his  veins  which  had  come  of  late  to 
him,  which  beat  higher,  even  poignantly,  when 
she  was  near  him  now,  was  only  the  reflection  of 
what  he  felt  for  his  wife.  She  knew  the  unmerci- 
ful truth,  but  it  only  deepened  what  she  felt  for 
him,  yet  what  she  must  put  away  from  herself 
after  to-morrow.  Those  verses  she  wrote — they 
were  to  show  that  she  had  conquered  herself! 
Yet,  but  a  few  hours  after,  here  she  was  kneel- 
ing outside  his  door  at  night,  here  she  was  pur- 
suing him  to  the  place  where  he  slept.  The  com- 
ing of  the  other  woman — she  knew  well  that  she 
was  something  to  this  man  of  men — had  roused 
in  her  all  she  had  felt,  had  terribly  intensified 
it. 

She  trembled,  but  she  drew  near,  accompanied 
by  the  heavenly  odors  of  the  freshened  herbs  and 
foliage  and  the  cool  tenderness  of  the  river  close 
by.  In  her  white  dress  and  loosened  hair  she  was 
like  some  spirit  of  a  new-born  world  finding  her 
[172] 


NIGHT      SHADE 


way  to  the  place  she  must  call  home.  It  was  all 
so  dim,  so  like  clouded  silver,  the  trees  and  the 
grass  and  the  bushes  and  the  night.  Noiselessly 
she  stole  over  the  grass  and  into  the  shadows  of 
the  trees  where  he  lay.  Again  aid  again  she 
paused.  What  would  she  do  if  he  was  awake 
and  saw  her'?  She  did  not  know.  The  moment 
must  take  care  of  itself.  She  longed  to  find  him 
sleeping. 

It  was  so.  The  hazy  light  showed  his  face  up- 
ward to  the  skies,  his  breast  rising  and  falling  in 
a  heavy,  luxurious  sleep. 

She  drew  nearer  and  nearer  till  she  was  kneel- 
ing beside  him.  His  face  was  warm  with  colour 
even  in  the  night  air — warmer  than  she  had  ever 
seen  it.  One  hand  lay  across  his  chest  and  one 
was  thrown  back  over  his  head  with  the  abandon 
of  perfect  rest.  All  the  anxiety  and  restlessness 
which  had  tortured  him  had  fled,  and  his  man- 
hood showed  bold  and  serene  in  the  lightening 
dusk. 

A  sob  almost  broke  from  her  as  she  gazed  her 
fill,  then  slowly  she  leaned  over  and  softly 
pressed  her  lips  to  his — the  first  time  that  ever  in 
love  they  had  been  given  to  any  man.  She  had 
the  impulse  to  throw  her  arms  round  him,  but 
[173] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

she  mastered  herself.  He  stirred,  but  he  did  not 
wake.  His  lips  moved  as  she  withdrew  hers. 

"My  darling,"  he  said  in  the  quick,  broken  way 
of  the  dreamer. 

She  rose  swiftly  and  fled  away  among  the  trees 
towards  the  house. 

What  he  had  said  in  his  sleep — was  it  in 
reality  the  words  of  unconsciousness,  or  was  it 
subconscious  knowledge"? — they  kept  ringing  in 
her  ears. 

"My  darling!"  he  had  said  when  she  kissed 
him.  There  was  a  light  of  joy  in  her  eyes  now, 
though  she  felt  that  the  words  were  meant  for 
another.  Yet  it  was  her  kiss,  her  own  kiss  which 
had  made  him  say  it.  If — but  with  happy  eyes 
she  stole  to  her  room. 


[174] 


CHAPTER  X 

"S.    O.    S." 


AT  breakfast  next  morning  Kitty  did  not  ap- 
pear. Had  it  been  possible  she  would  have 
fled  into  the  far  prairie  and  set  up  a  lonely  taber- 
nacle there;  for  with  the  day  came  a  reaction 
from  the  courage  possessing  her  the  night  before 
and  in  the  opal  wakening  of  the  dawn.  When 
broad  daylight  came  she  felt  as  though  her  bones 
were  water  and  her  body  a  wisp  of  straw.  She 
could  not  bear  to  meet  Shiel  Crozier's  eyes,  and 
thus  it  was  she  had  an  early  breakfast  on  the  plea 
that  she  had  ironing  to  do.  She  was  not,  how- 
ever, prepared  to  see  Jesse  Bulrush  drive  up  with 
a  buggy  after  breakfast  and  take  Crozier  away. 
When  she  did  see  them  at  the  gate  the  impulse 
came  to  cry  out  to  Crozier — what  to  say  she  did 
not  know,  but  still  to  cry  out.  The  cry  on 
her  lips  was  that  which  she  had  seen  in  the  news- 
[175] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

paper  the  day  before,  the  cry  of  the  shipwrecked 
seafarers,  the  signal  of  the  wireless  telegraphy, 
"S.  O.  S."— the  piteous  call,  "Save  Our  Souls!" 
It  sprang  to  her  lips,  but  it  got  no  further  save 
in  an  unconscious  whisper.  On  the  instant  she 
felt  so  weak  and  shaken  and  lonely  that  she 
wanted  to  lean  upon  some  one  stronger  than  her- 
self; as  she  used  to  lean  against  her  father  while 
he  sat  with  one  arm  round  her  studying  his  rail- 
way problems.  She  had  been  self-sufficient 
enough  all  her  life, — "an  independent  little  bird 
of  freedom,"  as  Crozier  had  called  her — but  she 
was  like  a  boat  tossed  on  mountainous  waves 
now. 

"S.  O.  S.!— Save  our  souls!" 

As  though  she  really  had  made  this  poignant 
call  Crozier  turned  round  in  the  buggy  where  he 
sat  with  Jesse  Bulrush,  pale  but  erect;  and,  with 
a  strange  instinct,  he  looked  straight  to  where 
she  was.  When  he  saw  her  his  face  flushed,  he 
could  not  have  told  why.  Was  it  that  there  had 
passed  to  him  in  his  sleep  the  subconscious  knowl- 
edge of  the  kiss  which  Kitty  had  given  him;  and, 
after  all,  had  he  said  "My  darling"  to  her  and  not 
to  the  wife  far  away  across  the  seas,  as  he 
thought*?  A  strange  feeling,  as  of  secret  inti- 
[176] 


s  .    o  .    s  . 


macy,  never  felt  before  where  Kitty  was  con- 
cerned, passed  through  him  now,  and  he  was  sud- 
denly conscious  that  things  were  not  as  they  had 
ever  been,  that  the  old  impersonal  comradeship 
had  vanished.  It  disturbed,  it  almost  shocked 
him.  Whereupon  he  made  a  valiant  effort  to 
recover  the  old  ground,  to  get  out  of  the  new  at- 
mosphere into  the  old,  cheering  air. 

"Come  and  say  good-bye,  won't  you?"  he 
called  to  her. 

"S.  O.  S.— S.  O.  S.— S.  O.  S. !"  was  the  cry 
in  her  heart,  but  she  called  back  to  him  from 
her  lips,  "I  can't.  I'm  too  busy.  Come  back 
soon,  soldier." 

With  a  wave  of  the  hand  he  was  gone.  "Not 
a  care  in  the  world  she  has,"  Crozier  said  to  Jesse 
Bulrush.  "She's  the  sunniest  creature  Heaven 
ever  made." 

"Too  skittish  for  me,"  responded  the  other  with 
a  sidelong  look,  for  he  had  caught  a  note  in  Cro- 
zier's  voice  which  gave  him  a  sudden  suspicion. 

"You  want  the  kind  you  can  drive  with  an 
oat-straw  and  a  chirp — eh,  my  friend?" 

"Well,  I've  got  what  I  want,"  was  the  reply. 
"Neither  of  us  '11  kick  over  the  traces." 

"You  are  a  lucky  man,"  replied  Crozier. 
[177] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"You've  got  a  remarkably  big  prize  in  the  lot- 
tery. She  is  a  fine  woman,  is  Nurse  Egan,  and 
I  owe  her  a  great  deal.  I  only  hope  things  turn 
out  so  well  that  I  can  give  her  a  good,  fat  wed- 
ding-present. But  I  sha'n't  be  able  to  do  any- 
thing that's  close  to  my  heart  if  I  can't  get  the 
cash  for  my  share  in  the  syndicate." 

"Courage,  soldier,  as  Kitty  Tynan  says,"  re- 
sponded Jesse  Bulrush  cheerily.  "You  never 
know  your  luck.  The  cash  is  waiting  for  you 
somewhere,  and  it'll  turn  up,  be  sure  of  that." 

"I'm  not  sure  of  that.  I  can  see  as  plain  as 
your  nose  how  Bradley  and  his  clique  have 
blocked  me  everywhere  from  getting  credit, 
and  I'd  give  five  years  of  my  life  to  beat 
them  in  their  dirty  game.  If  I  fail  to  get  it  at 
Aspen  Vale  I'm  done.  But  I'll  have  a  try — a 
good,  big  try.  How  far  exactly  is  it"?  I've 
never  gone  by  this  trail." 

Bulrush  shook  his  head  reprovingly.  "It's  too 
long  a  journey  for  you  to  take  after  your  knock- 
out. You're  not  fit  to  travel  yet.  I  don't  like 
it  a  bit.  Lydia  said  this  morning  it  was  a  crime 
against  yourself,  going  off  like  this,  and — " 

"Lydia? — oh,  yes,  pardonnez  moi^  m'sieu' !     I 
did  not  know  her  name  was  Lydia." 
[178] 


'8.     O.      S  .  ' 

"I  didn't  either  till  after  we  were  engaged." 

Crozier  stared  in  blank  astonishment.  "You 
didn't  know  her  name  till  after  you  were  en- 
gaged4? What  did  you  call  her  before  that  or 
then1?" 

"Why,  I  called  her  Nurse,"  answered  the  fat 
lover.  "We  all  called  her  that,  and  it  sounded 
comfortable  and  homelike  and  good  for  every 
day.  It  sounded  as  though  you  had  confidence 
and  your  life  was  in  her  hands — a  first-class  you- 
and-me  kind  of  feeling." 

"Why  don't  you  stick  to  it,  then?" 

"She  doesn't  want  it.  She  says  it  sounds  so 
old,  and  that  I'd  be  calling  her  'mother'  next." 

"And  won't  you*?"  asked  Crozier  slyly. 

"Everything  in  season,"  beamed  Jesse,  and  he 
shone,  and  was  at  once  happy  and  composed. 

Crozier  relapsed  into  silence,  for  he  was  think- 
ing that  the  lost  years  had  been  barren  of  chil- 
dren. He  turned  back  to  the  home  they  had 
left.  It  was  some  distance  away  now,  but  he 
could  see  Kitty  still  at  the  comer  of  the  house 
with  a  small  harvest  of  laundered  linen  in  her 
hand. 

"She  made  that  fresh  bed  of  boughs  for  me — 
ah,  but  I  had  a  good  sleep  last  night!"  he  added 
[179] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

aloud.  "I  feel  fit  for  the  fight  before  me."  He 
drew  himself  up  and  began  to  nod  here  and  there 
to  people  who  greeted  him. 

In  the  house  behind  them  at  that  moment  Kitty 
was  saying  to  her  mother,  "Where  is  he  going, 
mother?' 

"To  Aspen  Vale,"  was  the  reply.  "If  you'd 
been  at  breakfast  you'd  have  heard.  He'll  be 
gone  two  days,  perhaps  three." 

Three  days!  She  regretted  now  that  she  had 
not  said  to  herself,  "Courage,  soldier,"  and  gone 
to  say  good-bye  to  him  when  he  called  to  her. 
Perhaps  she  would  not  see  him  again  till  after 
the  other  woman — till  after  the  wife — came. 
Then — then  the  house  would  be  empty;  then  the 
house  would  be  so  still.  And  then  John  Sibley 
would  come  and — 


[180] 


CHAPTER  XI 

IN    THE   CAMP    OF   THE 
DESERTER 


THREE  days  passed,  but  before  they  ended 
there  came  another  telegram  from  Mrs.  Cro- 
zier  stating  the  time  of  her  expected  arrival  at 
Askatoon.  It  was  addressed  to  Kitty,  and  Kitty 
almost  savagely  tore  it  up  into  little  pieces  and 
scattered  it  to  the  winds.  She  did  not  even  wait 
to  show  it  to  the  Young  Doctor;  but  he  had  a 
subtle  instinct  as  to  why  she  did  not;  and  he  was 
rather  more  puzzled  than  usual  at  what  was  pass- 
ing before  his  eyes.  In  any  case,  the  coming  of 
the  wife  must  alter  all  the  relations  existing  in 
the  household  of  the  widow  Tynan.  The  old, 
unrestrained,  careless  friendship  could  not  con- 
tinue. The  newcomer  would  import  an  element 
of  caste  and  class  which  would  freeze  mother 
and  daughter  to  the  bones.  Crozier  was  the  es- 

[181] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

sence  of  democracy,  which  in  its  purest  form  is 
akin  to  the  most  aristocratic  element  and  is  easily 
affiliated  with  it.  He  had  no  fear  of  Crozier. 
Crozier  would  remain  exactly  the  same;  but 
would  not  Crozier  be  whisked  away  out  of  Aska- 
toon  to  a  new  fate,  reconciled  to  being  a  receiver 
of  his  wife's  bounty*? 

"If  his  wife  gets  her  arms  round  his  neck,  and 
if  she  wants  to  get  them  there,  she  will,  and  once 
there  he'll  go  with  her  like  a  gentleman,"  said 
the  Young  Doctor  sarcastically.  Admiring 
Crozier  as  he  did,  he  also  had  underneath  all  his 
knowledge  of  life  a  wholesome  fear — or  an  un- 
reasonable apprehension  of  man's  weakness  where 
a  woman  was  concerned.  The  man  who  would 
face  a  cannon's  mouth  would  falter  before  the 
face  of  a  woman  whom  he  could  crumple  with 
one  hand. 

The  wife  arrived  before  Crozier  returned,  and 
he  and  Kitty  met  the  train.  The  local  telegraph- 
ist had  not  divulged  to  any  one  the  contents  of 
the  telegram  to  Kitty,  and  there  were  no  staring 
spectators  on  the  platform.  As  the  great  express 
stole  in  almost  noiselessly,  like  a  tired  serpent, 
Kitty  watched  its  approach  with  outward  cheer- 

[182] 


THE      CAMP      OF      THE      DESERTER 

fulness.  She  had  braced  herself  to  this  moment 
till  she  looked  the  most  buoyant,  joyous  thing 
in  the  world.  It  had  not  come  easily.  With 
desperation  she  had  fought  a  fight  during  these 
three  lonely  days,  till  at  last  she  had  conquered, 
sleeping  each  night  on  Crozier's  bed  of  boughs 
under  the  stars,  and  coming  in  with  the  opal  light 
of  dawn.  Now  she  leaned  forward  with  heart 
beating  fast,  but  with  smiling  face  and  with 
eyes  so  bright  that  she  deceived  the  Young  Doc- 
tor. 

There  wai  no  sign  of  inward  emotion,  of  hid- 
den troubles,  as  she  leaned  forward  to  see  the 
great  lady  step  from  the  train — great  in  every 
sense  was  this  lady  in  her  mind;  imposing  in  stat- 
ure, a  Juno,  a  tragedy  queen,  a  Zenobia,  a  daugh- 
ter of  the  gods  who  would  not  stoop  to  conquer. 
She  looked  in  vain,  however,  for  the  Mrs.  Cro- 
zier  she  had  imagined  made  no  appearance  from 
the  train.  She  hastened  down  the  platform  still 
with  keen  eyes  scanning  the  passengers  who  were 
mostly  alighting  to  stretch  their  legs  and  get  a 
breath  of  air. 

"She's  not  here,"  she  said  at  last  darkly  to  the 
Young  Doctor  who  had  followed  her. 

Then  suddenly  she  saw  emerge  from  a  little 
[183] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

group  at  the  steps  of  a  car  a  child  in  a  long 
dress — so  it  seemed  to  her,  the  being  was  so 
small  and  delicate — and  come  forward,  having 
hastily  said  good-bye  to  her  fellow-passengers. 
As  the  Young  Doctor  said  afterwards,  "She 
wasn't  bigger  than  a  fly,"  and  she  certainly  was  as 
graceful  and  pretty  and  piquante  as  a  child- 
woman  could  be. 

Now,  with  her  alert,  rather  assertive  blue  eyes 
she  saw  Kitty,  and  came  forward.  "Miss 
Tynan1?"  she  asked  with  a  smile  and  an  encom- 
passing look. 

Now  Kitty  was  idiomatic  in  her  speech  at 
times,  and  she  occasionally  used  slang  of  the  best 
brand,  but  she  avoided  those  colloquialisms  which 
were  merely  part  of  the  vocabulary  of  the  un- 
educated. Indeed,  she  had  had  no  inclination  to 
use  them,  for  her  father  had  set  her  a  good 
example,  and  she  liked  to  hear  good  English 
spoken.  That  was  why  Crozier's  talk  had  been 
like  music  to  her;  and  she  had  been  keen  to  dis- 
tinguish between  the  studied  rhetorical  method 
of  Augustus  Burlingame,  who  modelled  himself 
on  the  orators  of  all  the  continents,  and  was 
what  might  be  called  a  synthetic  elocutionist. 
Kitty  herself  was  as  simple  and  natural  as  a  girl 

[184] 


THE      CAMP      OF      THE      DESERTER 

could  be,  and  as  a  rule  had  herself  in  perfect  com- 
mand; but  she  was  so  stunned  by  the  sight  of 
this  petite  person  before  her  that  in  reply  to  Mrs. 
Grazier's  question  she  only  said  abruptly — 

"The  same!" 

Then  she  came  to  herself  and  could  have  bitten 
her  tongue  out  for  that  plunge  into  the  vernacu- 
lar of  the  West;  and  forthwith  a  great  prejudice 
was  set  up  in  her  mind  against  Mona  Crozier,  in 
whose  eyes  she  caught  a  look  of  quizzical  criti- 
cism or,  as  she  thought,  contemptuous  comment. 
That  for  one  instant  she  had  been  caught  un- 
awares and  so  had  put  herself  at  a  disadvantage 
angered  her;  but  she  had  been  embarrassed  and 
confounded  by  this  miniature  Juno,  and  her  reply 
was  a  vague  echo  of  talk  she  heard  around  her 
every  day,  purely  mechanical  and  involuntary. 
Also  she  could  have  choked  the  Young  Doctor, 
whom  she  caught  looking  at  her  with  wondering 
humour,  as  though  he  was  trying  to  see  "what 
her  game  was" — as  he  said  to  her  afterwards. 

It  was  all  due  to  the  fact  that  from  the  day 
of  the  Logan  Trial,  and  particularly  from  the  day 
when  Shiel  Crozier  had  told  his  life-story,  she 
had  always  imagined  his  wife  as  a  stately 
Amazonian  being  with  the  bust  of  a  Juno  and 

[185] 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

the  carriage  of  a  Boadicea.  She  had  looked  for 
an  empress  in  splendid  garments,  and — and  here 
was  a  humming-bird  of  a  woman,  scarcely  bigger 
than  a  child,  with  the  buzzing  energy  of  a  bee, 
but  with  a  queer  sort  of  manfulness,  too;  with  a 
square,  slightly  projecting  chin,  as  Kitty  came 
to  notice  afterwards;  together  with  some  small 
lines  about  the  mouth  and  at  the  eyes  which  were 
indicative  of  trouble  endured  and  suffering  under- 
gone. Kitty  did  not  notice  that,  but  the  Young 
Doctor  took  it  in  with  his  embracing  glance  as  the 
wife  encompassed  Kitty  with  her  inward  com- 
ment, which  was — 

"So  this  is  the  chit  who  wrote  to  me  like  a 
mother !" 

But  Mona  Crozier  did  not  underestimate  Kitty 
for  all  that,  and  she  wondered  why  it  was  that 
Kitty  had  written  as  she  did.  One  thing  was 
quite  clear:  Kitty  had  had  good  intentions,  else 
why  have  written  at  all1? 

All  these  thoughts  had  passed  through  the 
mind  of  each  with  a  good  many  others  while  they 
were  shaking  hands,  and  the  Young  Doctor  sum- 
moned his  man  to  carry  Mona's  hand  luggage  to 
the  extra  buggy  he  had  brought  to  the  station. 
One  of  the  many  other  thoughts  that  were  passing 
[186] 


THE      CAMP      OF      THE     DESERTER 

through  three  active  minds  was  Kitty's  inward 
comment : 

"Just  think;  this  is  the  woman  that  he  talked 
of  as  if  she  was  a  sort  of  moving  mountain  which 
would  fall  on  you  and  crush  you,  if  you  didn't 
look  out!" 

No  doubt  Crozier  would  have  repudiated  this 
description  of  his  conversation,  but  the  fact  was 
he  had  unconsciously  talked  of  Mona  with  a  sort 
of  hush  in  his  voice,  as  expressing  his  own  awe; 
for  a  woman  to  him  was  always  something  out- 
side his  real  understanding.  He  had  a  romantic 
mediaeval  view,  which  translated  weakness  and 
beauty  into  a  miracle,  and  what  psychologists 
call  "an  inspired  control." 

"She's  no  bigger  than — than  a  wasp,"  said 
Kitty  to  herself,  after  the  Young  Doctor  had  as- 
sured Mrs.  Crozier  that  her  husband  was  almost 
well  again;  that  he  had  recovered  more  quickly 
than  was  expected,  and  had  gained  strength  won- 
derfully after  the  crisis  was  passed. 

"An  elephant  can  crush  you,  but  a  wasp  can 
sting  you,"  was  Kitty's  further  inward  comment, 
"and  that's  why  he  was  always  nervous  when  he 
spoke  of  her."  Then,  as  the  Young  Doctor  had 
already  done,  she  noticed  the  tiny  lines  about  the 
[187] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

tiny  mouth,  and  the  fine-spun  webs  about  the 
bird-bright  eyes. 

The  Young  Doctor  attributed  these  lines 
mostly  to  anxiety  and  inward  suffering,  but 
Kitty  set  them  down  as  the  outward  signs  of  an 
inward  fretfulness  and  quarrelsomeness,  which 
was  rendered  all  the  more  offensive  in  her  eyes 
by  the  fact  that  Mona  Crozier  was  the  most  spot- 
less thing  she  had  ever  seen,  at  the  end  of  a  jour- 
ney— and  this,  a  journey  across  a  continent. 
Orderliness  and  prim  exactness,  taste  and  fas- 
tidiousness, tireless  tidiness  were  seen  in  every 
turn,  in  every  fold  of  her  dress,  in  the  way  every- 
thing she  wore  had  been  put  on,  in  the  decision  of 
every  step  and  gesture. 

Kitty  noticed  all  this,  and  she  said  to  herself, 
"Wound  up  like  a  watch,  cut  like  a  cameo,"  and 
she  instinctively  felt  the  little  dainty  cameo 
brooch  at  her  own  throat,  the  only  jewelry  she 
ever  wore,  or  had  ever  worn. 

"Sensible  of  her  not  to  bring  a  maid,"  com- 
mented the  Young  Doctor  inwardly.  "That 
would  have  thrown  Kitty  into  a  fit.  But  how 
she  manages  to  look  like  this  after  six  thousand 
miles  of  sea  and  land  going  is  beyond  me — and 
Crozier  so  rather  careless  in  his  ways!  Not 

[188] 


THE      CAMP      OF      THE      DESERTER 

what  you  would  call  two  notes  in  the  same  key — 
she  and  Crozier,"  he  added  as  he  told  her  she 
need  not  trouble  about  her  luggage,  and  took 
charge  of  the  checks  for  it. 

"My  husband  was  not  well  enough  to  come 
to  the  train?"  Mrs.  Crozier  asked,  as  the  two- 
seated  "rig"  started  away  with  the  ladies  in  the 
back  seat. 

"Certainly,  if  he  had  known  of  your  coming," 
was  Kitty's  reply. 

"You  have  not  told  him  I  was  coming1?" 

"Wasn't  it  better  to  have  a  talk  with  you 
first?"  asked  Kitty  meaningly. 

Mrs.  Crozier  almost  nervously  twitched  the  lit- 
tle jet  bag  she  carried,  then  she  looked  Kitty  in 
the  eyes. 

"You  will,  of  course,  have  reason  for  thinking 
so,  if  you  say  it,"  was  her  enigmatical  reply. 
"And  of  course  you  will  tell  me.  You  did  not 
say  to  him  that  you  had  written  to  me,  or  that 
the  doctor  had  cabled  me?" 

"Oh,  you  got  his  cable?"  questioned  Kitty 
with  a  little  ring  of  triumph  in  her  voice,  meant 
to  reach  the  ears  of  the  Young  Doctor.  It  did 
reach  him,  and  he  replied  to  the  question. 

"We  thought  it  better  not;  chiefly  because  he 

[189] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

had  for  so  many  years  held  no  communication 
with  you,  and  had  lived — well,  you  may  say  he 
had  lived  a  life  that  did  not,  unfortunately,  take 
you  into  account." 

The  little  lady  blushed,  or  flushed.  "May  I 
ask  how  you  know  this  to  be  so — if  it  is  so,"  she 
asked,  and  there  was  the  sharpness  of  the  wasp 
in  her  tone,  as  it  seemed  to  Kitty. 

"The  Logan  Trial — I  mentioned  it  in  my  let- 
ter to  you,"  interposed  Kitty.  "He  was  shot  for 
the  evidence  he  gave  at  the  trial.  Well,  at  the 
trial  a  great  many  questions  were  asked  by  a 
lawyer  who  wanted  to  hurt  him,  and  he  an- 
swered them." 

"Why  did  the  lawyer  want  to  hurt  him?" 
Mona  Crozier  asked  quickly. 

"Just  mean-hearted  envy  and  spite  and 
deviltry,"  was  Kitty's  answer.  "They  were  both 
handsome  men,  and  perhaps  that  was  it." 

"I  never  thought  my  husband  handsome, 
though  he  was  always  distinguished  looking," 
was  the  quiet  reply. 

"Ah,  but  you  haven't  seen  him  or  heard  from 
him  for  so  long!"  remarked  Kitty  a  little  spite- 
fully. 

"How  do  you  know  that*?"     Mrs.  Crozier  was 

[190] 


THE      CAMP      OF      THE      DESERTER 

nettled,  though  she  did  not  show  it;  but  Kitty 
felt  it  was  so,  and  was  glad. 

"He  said  so  at  the  Logan  Trial." 

"Was  that  the  kind  of  question  asked  at  the 
trial?"  the  wife  quickly  interjected. 

"Yes,  lots  of  that  kind,"  returned  Kitty. 

"What  was  the  object?" 

"To  make  him  look  not  so  distinguished — like 
nothing.  If  a  man  wasn't  handsome,  but  only 
distinguished" — Kitty's  mood  was  dangerous — 
"and  you  make  him  look  cheap,  that's  one  advan- 
tage, and — " 

Here  the  Young  Doctor,  having  observed  the 
rising  tide  of  antagonism  in  the  tone  of  the  voices 
behind  him,  gently  interposed,  and  made  it  clear 
that  the  purpose  was  to  throw  a  shadow  on  the 
past  of  her  husband  in  order  to  discredit  his  evi- 
dence; to  which  Mrs.  Crozier  nodded  her  under- 
standing. She  liked  the  Young  Doctor,  as  who 
did  not  who  came  in  contact  with  him,  except 
those  who  had  fear  of  him,  and  who  had  an  idea 
that  he  could  read  their  minds  as  he  read  their 
bodies.  And  even  this  girl  at  her  side — Mona 
Crozier  realised  that  the  part  she  had  played  was 
evidently  an  unselfish  one,  though  she  felt  with 
strange  accuracy  and  piercing  intuition  that  what- 

[191] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

ever  her  husband  thought  of  the  girl,  the  girl 
thought  too  much  of  her  husband.  Somehow, 
all  in  a  moment,  it  made  her  sorry  for  the  girl's 
sake.  The  girl  had  meant  well  by  her  husband 
in  sending  for  his  wife — that  was  certain;  and 
she  did  not  look  bad.  She  was  too  neat,  too 
sedately  and  reservedly  dressed,  in  spite  of  her 
auriferous  face  and  head  and  her  burnished  tone, 
to  be  bad:  too  fearless  in  eye,  too  concentrated 
to  be  the  rover  in  fields  where  she  had  no  tenure 
or  right. 

She  turned  and  looked  Kitty  squarely  in  the 
eyes,  and  a  new,  softer  look  came  into  her  own, 
subduing  what  to  Kitty  was  the  challenging  alert- 
ness and  selfish  inquisitiveness  and  superficiality. 

"You  have  been  very  good  to  Shiel — you  two 
kind  people,"  she  said,  and  there  came  a  sudden 
faint  mist  to  her  eyes. 

That  was  her  lucky  moment,  and  she  spoke  as 
she  did  just  in  time,  for  Kitty  was  beginning  to 
resent  her  deeply;  to  dislike  her  far  more  than 
was  reasonable  and  certainly  without  any  jus- 
tice. 

Kitty  spoke  up  quickly.  "Well,  you  see,  he 
was  always  kind  and  good  to  other  people,  and 
that  was  why — " 

[192] 


THE      CAMP      OF     THE     DESERTER 

"But  that  Mr.  Burlingame  did  not  like  him"?" 
The  wife  had  a  strange  intuition  regarding  Mr. 
Burlingame.  She  was  sure  that  there  was  a 
woman  in  the  case — the  girl  beside  her? 

"That  was  because  Mr.  Burlingame  was  not 
kind  or  good  to  other  people,"  was  Kitty's  sedate 
response. 

There  was  an  undertone  of  reflection  in  the 
voice  which  did  not  escape  Mrs.  Crozier's  senses, 
and  it  also  caught  the  ear  of  the  Young  Doctor, 
to  whom  there  came  a  sudden  revelation  of  the 
reason  why  Burlingame  had  left  Mrs.  Tynan's 
house. 

"Oh — !"  exclaimed  Mrs.  Crozier  enigmatic- 
ally. Presently  with  a  quick  impulse  of  sup- 
pressed excitement  as  she  saw  the  Young  Doctor 
reining  in  the  horses  slowly,  she  added:  "My 
husband — when  have  you  arranged  that  I  should 
see  him?" 

"When  he  gets  back — home,"  Kitty  replied 
with  an  accent  on  the  last  word. 

Mrs.  Crozier  started  visibly.  "When  he  gets 
back  home — back  from  where — he  is  not  here1?" 
she  asked  with  a  look  of  anxiety  and  in  a  tone  of 
chagrin.  She  had  come  a  long  way,  and  she  had 
pictured  this  meeting  at  the  end  of  the  journey 
[193] 


yOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

with  a  hundred  variations,  but  never  with  this 
one — that  she  should  not  see  him  at  once  when 
the  journey  was  over.  Was  it  hurt  pride  or  dis- 
appointed love  which  spoke  in  her  face,  in  her 
words?  After  all,  it  was  bad  enough  that  her 
private  life  and  affairs  should  be  dragged  out 
in  a  court  of  law;  that  these  two  kind  strangers 
whom  she  had  never  seen  till  a  few  minutes  ago, 
should  be  in  the  inner  circle  of  knowledge  of  the 
life  of  her  husband  and  herself,  without  her 
self-esteem  being  hurt  like  this.  She  was  very 
woman,  and  the  look  of  the  thing  was  not  nice  to 
her  eyes,  while  it  must  belittle  her  in  theirs. 
Had  this  girl  done  it  on  purpose4?  Yet  why 
should  she — she  who  had  so  appealed  to  her  to 
come  to  him,  have  sought  to  humiliate  her? 

Kitty  was  not  quite  sure  what  she  ought  to 
say.  "You  see,  we  expected  him  back  before 
this.  He  is  very  exact — " 

"Very  exact?"  asked  Mrs.  Crozier  in  astonish- 
ment. This  was  a  new  phase  of  Shiel  Crozier's 
character.  He  must,  indeed,  have  changed  since 
he  had  caused  her  so  much  anxiety  in  days  gone 
by. 

"Usen't  he  to  be  so?"  asked  Kitty  a  little 
viciously.  "He  is  so  very  exact  now,"  she  added. 

[194] 


THE     CAMP     OF     THE      DESERTER 

"He  expected  to  be  back  home  before  this" — 
how  she  loved  to  use  that  word  home — "and  so 
we  thought  he  would  be  here  when  you  arrived. 
But  he  has  been  detained  at  Aspen  Vale.  He 
had  a  big  business  deal  on — " 

"A  big  business  deal*?  Is  he — is  he  in  a  large 
way  of  business?"  Mona  asked  almost  incredu- 
lously and  breathlessly.  Shiel  Crozier  in  a  large 
way  of  business,  in  a  big  business  deal — it  did 
not  seem  possible.  His  had  ever  been  the  game 
of  chance.  Business — business? 

"He  doesn't  talk  himself,  of  course;  that 
wouldn't  be  like  him" — Kitty  had  joy  in  giving 
this  wife  the  character  of  her  husband — "but  they 
say  that  if  he  succeeds  in  what  he's  trying  to  do 
now  he  will  make  a  great  deal  of  money." 

"Then  he  has  not  made  it  yet?"  asked  Mrs. 
Crozier. 

"He  has  always  been  able  to  pay  his  board 
regularly,  with  enough  left  for  a  pew  in  church," 
answered  Kitty  with  dry  malice;  for  she  mistook 
the  light  in  the  other's  eyes,  and  thought  it  was 
avarice;  and  the  love  of  money  had  no  place  in 
Kitty's  make-up.  She  herself  would  never  have 
been  influenced  by  money  where  a  man  was  con- 
cerned. 

[195] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

"Here's  the  house,"  she  quickly  added;  "our 
home — where  Mr.  Crozier  lives.  He  has  the 
best  room,  so  yours  won't  be  quite  so  good.  It's 
mother's — she's  giving  it  up  to  you.  I  suppose 
with  your  trunks  and  things  you'll  want  a  room 
to  yourself,"  added  Kitty,  not  at  all  unconscious 
that  she  was  putting  a  phase  of  the  problem  of 
Crozier  and  his  wife  in  a  very  common-place  way ; 
but  she  did  not  look  into  Mrs.  Crozier's  face  as 
she  said  it. 

Mrs.  Crozier,  however,  was  fully  conscious  of 
the  poignancy  of  the  remark,  and  once  again  her 
face  flushed  slightly  though  she  retained  outward 
composure. 

"Mother,  mother,  are  you  there1?"  Kitty  called 
as  she  escorted  the  wife  up  the  garden  walk. 

An  instant  later  Mrs.  Tynan  cheerfully  wel- 
comed the  disturber  of  the  peace  of  the  home 
where  Shiel  Crozier  had  been  the  central  figure 
for  so  long. 


[196] 


CHAPTER  XII 

AT   THE   RECEIPT   OF 
CUSTOMS 


"T  T  7  HAT  are  you  laughing  at,  Kitty?  You 
W  cackle  like  a  young  hen  with  her  first 
egg."  So  spoke  Mrs.  Tynan  to  her  daughter, 
who  alternately  swung  backwards  and  forwards 
in  a  big  rocking-chair,  silently  gazing  into  the  dis- 
tant sky,  or  sat  still  and  "cackled"  as  her  mother 
had  remarked. 

A  person  of  real  observation  and  astuteness, 
however,  would  have  noticed  that  Kitty's  laugh- 
ter told  a  story  which  was  not  joy  and  gladness — 
neither  good  humour  nor  the  abandonment  of  a 
luxurious  nature.  It  was  reflectively  scornful,  it 
was  tinged  with  bitterness  and  had  the  smart  of 
the  nettle. 

Her  mother's  question  only  made  her  laugh  the 
[  197  ] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

more,  and  at  last  Mrs.  Tynan  stooped  over  her 
and  said,  "I  could  shake  you,  Kitty.  You'd 
make  a  snail  fidget,  and  I've  got  enough  to  do  to 
keep  my  senses  steady  with  all  the  house  work — 
and  now  her  in  there!"  She  tossed  a  hand  be- 
hind her  fretfully. 

Quick  with  love  for  her  mother  as  she  always 
was,  Kitty  caught  the  other's  trembling  hand. 
"You've  always  had  too  much  to  do,  mother — 
always  been  slaving  for  others.  You've  never 
had  time  to  think  whether  you're  happy  or  not, 
or  whether  you've  got  a  problem — that's  what 
people  call  things,  when  they've  got  so  much  time 
on  their  hands  that  they  make  a  play  of  their 
inside  feelings  and  work  it  up  till  it  sets  them 
crazy." 

Mrs.  Tynan's  mouth  tightened  and  her  brow 
clouded.  "I've  had  my  problems  too,  but  I  al- 
ways made  quick  work  of  them.  They  never  had 
a  chance  to  overlay  me  like  a  mother  overlays  her 
baby  and  kills  it." 

"Not  'like  a  mother  overlays,'  but  'as  a  mother 
overlays,'  "  returned  Kitty  with  a  queer  note  to 
her  voice.  "That's  what  they  taught  me  at 
school.  The  teacher  was  always  picking  us  up 
on  that  kind  of  thing.  I  said  a  thing  worse  than 
[198] 


AT  THE   RECEIPT   OF   CUSTOMS 

that  when  Mrs.  Crozier — "  her  fingers  motioned 
towards  another  room — "came  to-day.  I  don't 
know  what  possessed  me.  I  was  off  my  trolly, 
I  suppose,  as  John  Sibley  puts  it.  Well,  when 
Mrs.  James  Shiel  Gathorne  Crozier  said — oh,  so 
sweetly  and  kindly — 'You  are  Miss  Tynan  ?' 
what  do  you  think  I  replied1?  I  said  to  her, 
The  same' !" 

Rather  an  acidly  satisfied  smile  came  to  Mrs. 
Tynan's  lips.  "That  was  like  the  Slatterly 
girls,"  she  replied.  "Your  father  would  have 
said  it  was  the  vernacular  of  the  rail-head.  He 
was  a  great  man  for  odd  words,  but  he  knew  al- 
ways just  what  he  wanted  to  say  and  he  said  it 
out.  You've  got  his  gift.  You  always  say  the 
right  thing,  and  I  don't  know  why  you  made  that 
break  with  her — of  all  people." 

A  meditative  look  came  into  Kitty's  eyes. 
"Mr.  Crozier  says  every  one  has  an  imp  that 
loves  to  tease  us,  and  trip  us  up,  and  make  us 
appear  ridiculous  before  those  we  don't  want  to 
have  any  advantage  over  us." 

"I  don't  want  Mrs.  Crozier  to  have  any  ad- 
vantage over  you  and  me,  I  can  tell  you  that. 
Things'll  never  be  the  same  here  again,  Kitty 
dear,  and  we've  all  got  on  so  well — with  him  so 

[199] 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

considerate  of  every  one,  and  a  good  friend  al- 
ways, and  just  one  of  us,  and  his  sickness  mak- 
ing him  seem  like  our  own,  and — " 

"Oh,  hush — will  you  hush,  mother!'1  inter- 
posed Kitty  sharply.  "He's  going  away  with 
her  back  to  the  old  country,  and  we  might  just 
as  well  think  about  getting  other  boarders,  for 
I  suppose  Mr.  Bulrush  and  his  bonny  bride  will 
set  up  a  little  bulrush  tabernacle  on  the  banks 
of  the  Nile" — she  nodded  in  the  direction  of  the 
river  outside — "and  they'll  find  a  little  Moses 
and  will  treat  it  as  their  very  own." 

"Kitty,  how  can  you!" 

Kitty  shrugged  a  shoulder.  "It  would  be  ri- 
diculous for  that  pair  to  have  one  of  their  own. 
It's  only  the  young  mother  with  a  new  baby  that 
looks  natural  to  me." 

"Don't  talk  that  way,  Kitty,"  rejoined  her 
mother  sharply.  "You  aren't  fit  to  judge  of  such 
things." 

"I  will  be  before  long,"  retorted  her  daughter. 
"Anyway,  Mrs.  Crozier  isn't  any  better  able  to 
talk  than  I  am,"  she  added  irrelevantly.  "She 
never  was  a  mother." 

"Don't  blame  her,"  said  Mrs.  Tynan  severely. 
"That's  God's  business.  I'd  be  sorry  for  her,  so 
[200] 


AT      THE      RECEIPT      OF      CUSTOMS 

far  as  that  was  concerned  if  I  were  you.  It's  not 
her  fault." 

"It's  an  easy  way  of  accounting  for  good  un- 
done," returned  Kitty.  "P'r'aps  it  was  God's 
fault,  and  p'r'aps  if  she  had  loved  him  more — " 

Mrs.  Tynan's  face  flushed  with  sudden  irrita- 
tion and  that  fretful  look  came  to  her  eyes  which 
accompanies  a  lack  of  comprehension.  "Upon 
my  word,  well,  upon  my  word,  of  all  the  vixens 
that  ever  lived,  and  you  looking  like  a  yellow 
pansy  and  too  sweet  for  daily  use!  Such 
thoughts  in  your  head — who'd  have  believed  that 
you—!" 

Kitty  made  a  mocking  face  at  her  mother. 
"I'm  more  than  a  girl,  I'm  a  woman,  mother,  who 
sees  life  all  around  me  from  the  insect  to  the 
mountain,  and  I  know  things  without  being  told. 
I  always  did.  Just  life  and  living  tell  me  things, 
and  maybe,  too,  the  Irish  in  me  that  father  was." 

"It's  so  odd.  You're  such  a  mixture  of  fun 
and  fancy — at  least  you  always  have  been;  but 
there's  something  new  in  you  these  days.  Kitty, 
you  make  me  afraid — yes,  you  make  your  mother 
afraid.  After  what  you  said  the  other  day  about 
Mr.  Crozier  I've  had  bad  nights,  and  I  get  nerv- 
ous thinking." 

[201] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

Kitty  suddenly  got  up,  put  her  arm  round  her 
mother  and  kissed  her.  "You  needn't  be  afraid 
of  me,  mother.  If  there'd  been  any  danger,  any 
real  danger,  I  wouldn't  have  told  you.  Mr. 
Crozier's  away,  and  when  he  comes  back  he'll 
find  his  wife  here,  and  there's  the  end  of  anything 
or  any  thinking.  If  there'd  been  danger,  it 
would  have  been  settled  the  night  before  he  went 
away.  I  kissed  him  that  night  as  he  was  sleep- 
ing out  there  under  the  trees." 

Mrs.  Tynan  sat  down  weakly  and  fanned  her- 
self with  her  apron.  "Oh,  oh,  oh,  dear  Lord!" 
she  said. 

"I'm  not  afraid  to  tell  you  anything  I  ever  did, 
mother,"  declared  Kitty  firmly;  "though  I'm  not 
prepared  to  tell  you  everything  I've  felt.  I 
kissed  him  as  he  slept.  He  didn't  wake,  he  just 
lay  there  sleeping — sleeping."  A  strange  dis- 
tant dreaming  look  came  into  her  eyes.  She 
smiled  like  one  who  saw  a  happy  vision,  and  an 
eerie  expression  stole  into  her  face.  "I  didn't 
want  him  to  wake,"  she  continued.  "I  asked 
God  not  to  let  him  wake.  If  he'd  waked — oh, 
I'd  have  been  ashamed  enough  till  the  day  I  died 
in  one  way!  Still  he'd  have  understood,  and 
he'd  have  thought  no  harm.  But  it  wouldn't  have 

[202] 


AT   THE   RECEIPT   OF   CUSTOMS 

been  fair  to  him — and  there's  his  wife  in  there," 
she  added,  breaking  off  into  a  different  tone. 
"They're  a  long  way  above  us — up  among  the 
peaks,  and  we're  at  the  foot  of  the  foothills, 
mother;  but  he  never  made  us  feel  that,  did  he*? 
The  difference  between  him  and  most  of  the  men 
I've  ever  seen!  The  difference!" 

"There's  the  Young  Doctor,"  said  her  mother 
reproachfully. 

"He — him !  He's  by  himself,  with  some- 
thing of  every  sort  in  him  from  the  top  to  the 
bottom.  There's  been  a  ditcher  in  his  family, 
and  there  may  have  been  a  duke.  But  Shiel 
Crozier — Shiel" — she  flushed  as  she  said  the  name 
like  that,  but  a  little  touch  of  defiance  came  into 
her  face,  too — "he  is  all  of  one  kind.  He's  not 
a  blend.  And  he's  married  to  her  in  there!" 

"You  needn't  speak  in  that  tone  about  her. 
She's  as  fine  as  can  be." 

"She's  as  fine  as  a  bee!"  retorted  Kitty. 
Again  she  laughed  that  mocking,  almost  mirth- 
less laugh  for  which  her  mother  had  called  her 
to  account  a  little  while  before.  "You  asked 
me  a  while  ago  what  I  was  laughing  at,  mother," 
she  continued.  "Why,  can't  you  guess*?  Mr. 
Crozier  talked  of  her  always  as  though  she  was — 

[203  ] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

well,  like  the  pictures  you've  seen  of  Britannia,  all 
swelling  and  spreading,  with  her  hand  on  a  shield 
and  her  face  saying,  'Look  at  me  and  be  good,' 
and  her  eyes  saying,  'Son  of  man,  get  upon  thy 
knees!'  Why,  I  expected — we  all  expected  to 
see — a  sort  of  great-goodness-gracious  goddess, 
that  kept  him  frightened  to  death  of  her.  Bless 
you,  he  never  opened  her  letter,  he  was  so  afraid 
of  her;  and  he  used  to  breathe  once  or  twice 
hard — like  that,  when  he  mentioned  her" — she 
breathed  with  such  mock  awe  that  her  mother 
laughed  with  a  little  touch  of  kindly  malice,  too. 

"Even  her  letter,"  Kitty  continued  remorse- 
lessly; "it  was  as  though  she — that  little  sprite — 
wrote  it  with  a  rod  of  chastisement,  as  the  Bible 
says.  It — " 

"What  do  you  know  of  the  inside  of  that  let- 
ter*?" asked  her  mother  staring. 

"What  the  steam  of  the  tea-kettle  could  let 
me  see,"  responded  Kitty  defiantly;  and  then,  to 
her  shocked  and  astonished  mother,  she  told  what 
she  had  done,  and  what  the  nature  of  the  letter 
was. 

"I  wanted  to  help  him  if  I  could,  and  I  think 
I'll  be  able  to  do  it — I've  thought  it  all  out," 
Kitty  added  eagerly  with  a  glint  of  steel  in  the 

[204] 


AT   THE   RECEIPT   OF   CUSTOMS 

gold  of  her  eyes  and  a  strange  fantastic  kind  of 
wisdom  in  her  look. 

"Kitty,"  said  her  mother  severely  and  anx- 
iously, "it's  madness  interfering  with  other  peo- 
ple's affairs — of  that  kind.  It  never  was  any 
use." 

"This  will  be  the  exception  to  the  rule,"  re- 
turned Kitty.  "There  she  is" — again  she 
flicked  a  hand  toward  the  other  room — "after 
they've  been  parted  five  years.  Well,  she  came 
after  she  read  my  letter  to  her,  and  after  I'd  read 
that  unopened  letter  to  him,  which  made  me 
know  how  to  put  it  all  to  her.  I've  got  intui- 
tion— that's  Celtic  and  mad,"  she  added  with  her 
chin  thrusting  out  at  her  mother,  to  whom  the 
Irish  that  her  husband  had  been,  which  was  so 
deep  in  her  daughter  was  ever  a  mystery  to  her, 
and  of  which  she  was  more  or  less  afraid. 

"I've  got  a  plan,  and  I  believe — I  know — it 
will  work,"  Kitty  continued.  "I've  been  think- 
ing and  thinking,  and  if  there's  trouble  between 
them;  if  he  says  he  isn't  going  on  with  her  till 
he's  made  his  fortune ;  if  he  throws  that  unopened 
letter  in  her  face,  I'll  bring  in  my  invention  to 
deal  with  the  problem,  and  then  you'll  see !  But 
all  this  fuss  for  a  little  tiny  button  of  a  thing 
[205  ] 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

like  that  in  there — pshaw!  Mr.  Crozier  is 
worth  a  real  queen  with  the  beauty  of  one  of  the 
Rhine  maidens — how  he  used  to  tell  that  story 
of  the  Rhinegold — do  you  remember!  Wasn't 
it  grand*?  Well,  I  am  glad  now  that  he's  go- 
ing— yes,  whatever  trouble  there  may  be,  still  he 
is  going.  I  feel  it  in  my  heart." 

She  paused  and  her  eyes  took  on  a  sombre  tone. 
Presently  with  a  slight  husky  pain  in  her  voice, 
like  the  faint  echo  of  a  wail,  she  went  on: 
"Now  that  he's  going  I'm  glad  we've  had  the 
things  he  gave  us,  things  that  can't  be  taken  away 
from  us.  What  you  have  enjoyed  is  yours  for- 
ever and  ever.  It's  memory;  and  for  one  mo- 
ment or  for  one  day  or  one  year  of  those  things 
you  loved,  there's  fifty  years,  perhaps,  for  mem- 
ory. Don't  you  remember  the  verses  I  cut  out 
of  the  newspaper: 

'Time,  the  ruthless  idol-breaker, 

Smileless,  cold  iconoclast, 
Though  he  rob  us  of  our  altars, 

Cannot  rob  us  of  the  past.'  " 

"That's  the  way  your  father  used  to  talk,"  re- 
plied her  mother  rather  helplessly.     "There's  a 
lot  of  poetry  in  you,  Kitty." 
[206] 


AT   THE   RECEIPT   OF   CUSTOMS 

"More  than  there  is  in  her*?"  asked  Kitty, 
again  indicating  the  region  where  Mrs.  Crozier 
was. 

"There's  as  much  poetry  in  her  as  there  is  in — 
in  me.  But  she  can  do  things — that  little  bit  of 
a  baby-woman  can  do  things,  Kitty.  I  know 
women,  and  I  tell  you  that  if  that  woman  hadn't 
a  penny,  she'd  set  to  and  earn  it;  and  if  her  hus- 
band hadn't  a  penny,  she'd  make  his  home  com- 
fortable just  the  same  somehow,  for  she's  as  ca- 
pable as  capable  can  be.  She  had  her  things  un- 
packed, her  room  in  order  herself — she  didn't 
want  your  help  or  mine — and  herself  with  a 
fresh  dress  on  before  you  could  turn  round." 

Kitty's  eyes  softened  still  more.  "Well,  if 
she'd  been  poor  he  would  never  have  left  her,  and 
then  they  wouldn't  have  lost  five  years, — think  of 
it,  five  years  of  life  with  the  man  you  love  lost 
to  you! — and  there  wouldn't  be  this  tough  old 
knot  to  untie  now." 

"She  has  suffered — that  little  sparrow  has  suf- 
fered, I  tell  you,  Kitty.  She  has  a  grip  on  her- 
self like— like— " 

"Like  Mr.  Crozier  with  a  bronco  under  his 
hand,"  interjected  Kitty.  "She's  too  neat  for 
me — too  eternally  spick  and  span  for  me,  mother. 
[207] 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

It's  as  though  the  Being  that  made  her  said, 
'Now  I'll  try  and  see  if  I  can  produce  a  model 
of  a  grown-up,  full-sized  piece  of  my  work.' 
Mrs.  Crozier  is  an  exhibition  model,  and  Shiel 
Crozier's  over  six  feet  three,  and  loose  and  free, 
and  like  a  wapiti  in  his  gait.  If  he  was  a  wapiti 
he'd  carry  the  finest  pair  of  antlers  ever  was." 

"Kitty,  you  make  me  laugh,"  responded  the 
puzzled  woman.  "I  declare,  you're  the  most 
whimsical  creature,  and — " 

At  that  moment  there  came  a  tapping  at 
the  door  behind  them,  and  a  small  silvery  voice 
said,  "May  I  come  in*?"  as  the  door  opened  and 
Mrs.  Crozier,  very  neatly  and  precisely  yet  pret- 
tily dressed,  entered. 

"Please  make  yourself  at  home — no  need  to 
rap,"  answered  Mrs.  Tynan.  "Out  in  the  West 
here  we  live  in  the  open  like.  There's  no  room 
closed  to  you,  if  you  can  put  up  with  what  there 
is,  though  it's  not  what  you're  used  to." 

"For  five  months  in  the  year  during  the  past 
five  years  I've  lived  in  a  house  about  half  as  large 
as  this,"  was  Mrs.  Crozier's  reply.  "With  my 
husband  away  there  wasn't  the  need  of  much 
room." 

"Well,  he  only  has  one  room  here,"  responded 
[208] 


AT  THE  RECEIPT  OF  CUSTOMS 

Mrs.  Tynan.     "He  never  seemed  too  crowded 
in  it." 

"Where  is  it*?  Might  I  see  it?"  asked  the 
small,  dark-eyed,  dark-haired  wife,  with  the  little 
touch  of  nectarine  bloom  and  a  little  powder 
also;  and  though  she  spoke  in  a  matter-of-fact 
tone  there  was  a  look  of  wistfulness  in  her  eyes, 
a  gleam  of  which  Kitty  caught  ere  it  passed. 

"You've  been  separated,  Mrs.  Grozier,"  an- 
swered the  elder  woman,  "and  I've  no  right  to 
let  you  into  his  room  without  his  consent. 
You've  had  no  correspondence  for  five  years — 
isn't  that  so?" 

"Did  he  tell  you  that?"  the  regal  little  lady 
asked  composedly,  but  with  an  underglow  of 
anger  in  her  eyes. 

"He  told  the  court  that  at  the  Logan  Trial," 
was  the  reply. 

"At  the  murder  trial — he  told  that?"  Mrs. 
Crozier  asked  almost  mechanically,  her  face  gone 
pale  and  a  little  haggard. 

"He  was  obliged  to  answer  when  that  wolf 
Gus  Burlingame  was  after  him,"  interposed 
Kitty  with  kindness  in  her  tone,  for,  suddenly, 
she  saw  through  the  outer  walls  of  the  little 
wife's  being  into  the  inner  courts.  She  saw  that 
[209] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

Mrs.  Crozier  loved  her  husband  now,  whatever 
she  had  done  in  the  past.  The  sight  of  love  does 
not  beget  compassion  in  a  loveless  heart,  but 
there  was  love  in  Kitty's  heart;  and  it  was  even 
greater  than  she  would  have  wished  any  human 
being  to  see;  and  by  it  she  saw  with  radium  clear- 
ness behind  the  veil  of  the  other  woman's  being. 

"Surely  he  could  have  avoided  answering 
that,"  urged  Mona  Crozier  bitterly. 

"Only  by  telling  a  lie,"  Kitty  quickly  an- 
swered, "and  I  don't  believe  he  ever  told  a  lie  in 
his  life.  Come,"  she  added,  "I  will  show  you 
his  room.  My  mother  needn't  do  it,  and  so  she 
won't  be  responsible.  You  have  your  rights  as 
a  wife  until  they're  denied  you.  You  mustn't 
come,  mother,"  she  said  to  Mrs.  Tynan,  and  she 
put  a  tender,  golden  hand  on  her  arm.  "This 
way,"  she  added  to  the  little  person  in  the  pale 
blue,  which  suited  well  her  very  dark  hair,  blue 
eyes,  and  rose-touched  cheeks. 


[210] 


CHAPTER  XIII 

KITTY    SPEAKS   HER   MIND 
AGAIN 


A  MOMENT  later  they  stood  inside  Shiel 
Crozier's  room.  The  first  glance  his  wife 
gave  encompassed  the  walls,  the  table,  the 
bureau,  and  the  desk  which  contained  her  own 
unopened  letter.  She  was  looking  for  a  photo- 
graph of  herself. 

There  was  none  in  the  room,  and  a  parched 
and  arid  look  came  into  her  face.  The  glance 
and  its  sequel  did  not  escape  Kitty's  notice. 
She  knew  well — as  who  would  not — what  Mona 
Crozier  was  hoping  to  see,  and  she  was  human 
enough  to  feel  a  kind  of  satisfaction  in  the  wife's 
evident  chagrin  and  disappointment;  for  the  un- 
opened letter  in  the  baize-covered  desk  which 
she  had  read  was  sufficient  warrant  for  a  punish- 
ment and  penalty  due  the  little  lady,  and  not 
[211] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

the  less  because  it  was  so  long  delayed.  Had  not 
Shiel  Crozier  had  his  bitter  herbs  to  drink  over 
the  past  five  years! 

Moreover  Kitty  was  sure  beyond  any  doubt 
at  all  that  Shiel  Crozier's  wife,  when  she  wrote 
the  letter,  did  not  love  her  husband,  or  at  least 
did  not  love  him  in  the  right  or  true  way.  She 
loved  him  only  so  far  as  her  then  selfish  nature 
permitted  her  to  do;  only  in  so  far  as  the  pride 
of  money  which  she  had,  and  her  husband  had 
not,  allowed  her  to  do;  only  in  so  far  as  the  na- 
ture of  a  tyrant  could  love  (though  the  tyranny 
was  pink  and  white  and  sweetly  perfumed  and 
had  the  lure  of  youth).  In  her  primitive  way 
Kitty  had  intuitively  apprehended  the  main 
truth,  and  that  was  sufficient  to  justify  her  in 
contributing  to  Mona  Crozier's  punishment. 

Kitty's  perceptions  were  true.  At  the  start 
Mona  was  in  nature  proportionate  to  her  size; 
and  when  she  married  she  had  not  loved  Crozier 
as  he  had  loved  her.  Maybe  that  was  why 
— though  he  may  not  have  admitted  it  to  him- 
self— he  could  not  bear  to  be  beholden  to  her 
when  his  ruin  came.  Love  makes  all  things  pos- 
sible, and  there  is  no  humiliation  in  taking  from 
one  who  loves  and  is  loved — that  uncapitalised 

[212] 


KITTY     SPEAKS     HER     MIND     AGAIN 

and  communal  partnership  which  is  not  of  the 
earth  earthy.  Perhaps  that  was  why,  though 
Shiel  loved  her,  he  had  had  a  bitterness  which 
galled  his  soul,  why  he  had  a  determination  to 
win  sufficient  wealth  to  make  himself  independ- 
ent of  her.  Down  at  the  bottom  of  his  chival- 
rous Irish  heart  he  had  learned  the  truth,  that  to 
be  dependent  on  her  would  beget  in  her  contempt 
for  him,  and  he  would  be  only  her  paid  paramour 
and  not  her  husband  in  the  true  sense.  Quixotic 
he  had  been,  but  under  his  quixotism  there  was  at 
least  the  shadow  of  a  great  tragical  fact,  and  it 
had  made  him  a  matrimonial  deserter.  Whether 
tragedy  or  comedy  would  emerge  was  all  on  the 
knees  of  the  gods. 

"It's  a  nice  room,  isn't  it*?"  asked  Kitty  when 
there  had  passed  from  Mona  Crozier's  eyes  the 
glaze  or  mist — not  of  tears,  but  stupefaction — 
which  had  followed  her  inspection  of  the  walls, 
the  bureau,  the  table,  and  the  desk. 

"Most  comfortable,  and  so  very  clean — quite 
spotless,"  the  wife  answered  admiringly,  and  yet 
a  little  drearily.  It  made  her  feel  humiliated 
that  her  man  could  live  this  narrow  life  of  one 
room  without  despair,  with  sufficient  resistance 
to  the  lure  of  her  hundred  and  fifty  thousand 

[213] 


yOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

pounds  and  her  own  delicate  and  charming  per- 
son. Here,  it  would  seem,  he  was  content.  One 
easy  chair  made  out  of  a  barrel,  a  couch,  a  bed 
— a  very  narrow  bed,  like  a  soldier's,  a  bed  for 
himself  alone — a  small  table,  a  shelf  on  the  wall 
with  a  dozen  books,  a  little  table,  a  bureau,  and 
an  old-fashioned,  sloping- topped,  shallow  desk 
covered  with  green  baize,  on  high  legs,  so  that 
he  could  stand  as  he  wrote  (Crozier  had  made 
that  high  stand  for  the  desk  himself)  like  a  sol- 
dier, too.  That  was  what  the  room  conveyed  to 
her — the  spirit  of  the  soldier,  bare,  clean,  strong, 
sparse,  a  workshop  and  a  chamber  of  sleep  in 
one,  like  the  tent  of  an  officer  on  the  march. 
After  the  feeling  had  come  to  her,  to  heighten  the 
sensation,  she  espied  a  little  card  hung  under  the 
small  mirror  on  the  wall.  There  was  writing  on 
it,  and  going  nearer  she  saw  in  red  pencil  the 
words,  "Courage,  soldier!" 

These  were  the  words  which  Kitty  was  so  fond 
of  using,  and  Kitty  had  a  thrill  of  triumph  now  as 
she  saw  the  woman  whom  Crozier  had  fled  from 
looking  at  the  card.  She  herself  had  come  and 
looked  at  it  many  times  since  Crozier  went  away, 
for  he  had  only  put  it  there  just  before  he  left 
on  this  last  expedition  to  Aspen  Vale  to  carry 

[214] 


KITTY      SPEAKS      HER     MIND     AGAIN 

through  his  deal.  It  had  brought  a  great  joy 
to  Kitty's  heart.  It  had  made  her  feel  that  she 
had  some  share  in  his  life;  that,  in  a  way,  she 
had  helped  him  on  the  march,  the  vivandiere  who 
carried  the  water-bag  which  would  give  him  drink 
when  parched,  battle-worn,  or  wounded. 

Mona  Crozier  turned  away  from  the  card, 
sadly  reflecting  that  nothing  in  the  room  recalled 
herself;  that  she  was  not  here  in  the  very  core 
of  his  life  in  even  the  smallest  way.  Yet  this 
girl,  this  sunny  creature  with  the  call  of  youth 
and  passion  in  her  eyes,  this  Ruth  of  the  wheat- 
fields,  came  and  went  from  this  room  as  though 
she  was  a  part  of  it.  She  did  this  and  that  for 
him,  and  no  doubt  was  on  such  terms  of  intimacy 
with  him  that  they  were  part  of  each  other's  life 
in  a  scheme  of  domesticity  which  was  unlike  any 
boarding-house  scheme  or  organisation  she  had 
ever  known.  Here  in  everything  there  was  the 
air  and  the  decorum  and  the  unartificial  comfort 
of  home.  Visions  of  apartments  and  lodgings 
and  boarding-houses  in  the  old  land  rose  up  be- 
fore her,  and  the  contrast  was  immeasurable. 

This  was  why  he  could  live  without  his  wedded 
wife  and  her  gold  and  her  brocade,  and  the  silk 
and  the  Persian  rugs,  and  the  grand  piano  and 
[215] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

the  carriages  and  the  high  silk  hat  from  Picca- 
dilly. Her  husband  had  had  the  luxuries  of 
wealth,  and  here  he  was  living  like  a  Spartan 
on  his  hill — and  alone;  though  he  had  a  wife 
whom  men  had  besieged  both  before  and  after 
marriage.  A  feeling  of  impotent  indignation  and 
anger  suddenly  took  possession  of  her.  Here  he 
was  with  two  women,  unattached, — one  interest- 
ing and  good  and  agreeable  and  good  looking, 
and  the  other  almost  a  beauty — who  were  part 
of  the  whole  rustic  scheme  in  which  he  lived. 
They  made  him  comfortable,  they  did  the  hun- 
dred things  that  a  valet  or  a  fond  wife  would 
do;  they  no  doubt  hung  on  every  word  he  ut- 
tered— and  he  could  be  interesting  beyond  most 
men.  She  had  realised  terribly  how  interesting 
he  was  after  he  had  fled;  when  men  came  about 
her  and  talked  to  her  in  many  ways,  with  many 
variations,  but  always  with  the  one  tune  behind 
all  they  said;  always  making  for  the  one  goal, 
no  matter  the  point  from  which  they  started  or 
how  circuitous  their  route. 

As  time  went  on  she  had  hungrily  longed  to 

see  her  husband,  and  other  men  had  no  power  to 

interest  her;  but  still  she  had  not  sought  to  find 

him.     At  first  it  had  been  offended  pride,  injured 

[216] 


KITTY      SPEAKS     HER     MIND     AGAIN 

self-esteem,  in  which  the  value  of  her  own  de- 
sirable self  and  of  her  very  desirable  gold,  was 
not  lost;  then  it  became  the  pride  of  a  wife  in 
whom  the  spirit  of  the  eternal  woman  was  work- 
ing; and  she  would  have  died  rather  than  have 
sought  to  find  him.  Five  years — and  not  a  word 
from  him. 

Five  years  and  not  a  letter  from  him!  Her 
eyes  involuntarily  fell  on  the  high  desk  with  the 
green  baize  top.  Of  all  the  letters  he  had  writ- 
ten at  that  desk  not  one  had  been  addressed  to 
her.  Slowly,  and  with  an  unintentional  solem- 
nity, she  went  up  to  it  and  laid  a  hand  upon  it. 
Her  chin  only  cleared  the  edge  of  it — he  was  a 
tall  man,  her  husband. 

"This  is  the  place  of  secrets,  I  suppose,"  she 
said  with  a  bright  smile  and  at  attempt  at  gaiety 
to  Kitty,  who  had  watched  her  with  burning 
eyes;  for  she  had  felt  the  thrill  of  the  moment. 
She  was  as  sensitive  to  atmosphere  of  this  sad 
play  of  life  as  nearly  and  as  vitally  as  the  de- 
serted wife. 

"I  shouldn't  think  it  a  place  of  secrets,"  Kitty 
answered  after  a  moment.  "He  seldom  locks  it, 
and  when  he  does  I  know  where  the  key  is." 

"Indeed?"  Mona  Crozier  stiffened.  A  look  of 
[217] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

reproach  and  reprobation  came  into  her  eyes.  It 
was  as  though  she  was  looking  down  from  a  great 
height  upon  a  poor  creature  who  did  not  know 
the  first  rudiments  of  personal  honour,  the  fine 
elemental  customs  of  life. 

Kitty  saw  and  understood,  but  she  did  not 
hasten  to  reply,  or  to  set  things  right.  She  met 
the  lofty  look  unflinchingly,  and  she  had  pride 
and  some  little  malice  too — it  would  do  Mrs.  Cro- 
zier  good,  she  thought — in  saying,  as  she  looked 
down  on  the  humming-bird  trying  to  be  an  eagle : 

"I've  had  to  get  things  for  him — papers  and 
so  on,  and  send  them  on  when  he  was  away,  and 
even  when  he  was  at  home  I've  had  to  act  for 
him;  and  so  even  when  it  was  locked  I  had  to 
know  where  the  key  was.  He  asked  me  to  help 
him  that  way." 

Mona  noted  the  stress  laid  upon  the  word 
"home,"  and  for  the  first  time  she  had  a  suspicion 
that  this  girl  knew  more  than  even  the  Logan 
Trial  had  disclosed,  and  that  she  was  being  sa- 
tirical and  suggestive. 

"Oh,  of  course,"  she  returned  cheerfully  in  re- 
sponse to  Kitty — "you  acted  as  a  kind  of  clerk 
for  him!" 

There  was  a  note  in  her  voice  which  she  might 
[218] 


KITTY      SPEAKS      HER      MIND     AGAIN 

better  not  have  used.  If  she  but  knew  it,  she 
needed  this  girl's  friendship  very  badly;  and  she 
might  have  remembered  that  she  would  not  have 
been  here  in  her  husband's  room  had  it  not  been 
for  the  letter  Kitty  had  written — a  letter  which 
had  made  her  heart  beat  so  hard  when  she  re- 
ceived it,  that  she  had  sunk  helpless  to  the  floor 
on  one  of  those  soft  rugs,  representing  the  soft 
comfort  which  money  can  bring. 

The  reply  was  like  a  slap  in  the  face. 

"I  acted  for  him  in  any  way  at  all  that  he 
wished  me  to,"  Kitty  answered  with  quiet  bold- 
ness and  shining  face. 

Mona's  hand  fell  away  from  the  green  baize 
desk,  and  her  eyes  again  lost  their  sight  for  a  mo- 
ment. Kitty  was  not  savage  by  nature.  She 
had  been  goaded  as  much  by  the  thought  of  the 
letter  Crozier's  wife  had  written  to  him  in  the 
hour  of  his  ruin  as  by  the  presence  of  the  woman 
in  this  house,  where  things  would  never  be  as 
they  had  been  before.  She  had  struck  hard,  and 
now  she  was  immediately  sorry  for  it:  for  this 
woman  was  here  in  response  to  her  own  appeal; 
and,  after  all,  she  might  well  be  jealous  of  the 
fact  that  Crozier  had  had  close  to  him  for  so  long 
and  in  such  conditions  a  girl  like  herself,  younger 
[219] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUQK 

than  his  own  wife — and  prettier — yes,  certainly 
prettier,  she  admitted  to  herself. 

"He  is  that  kind  of  a  man.  What  he  asked 
for,  any  good  woman  could  give  and  not  be  sorry," 
Kitty  added  presently  when  the  knife  had  gone 
deep  enough. 

"Yes,  he  was  that  kind  of  a  man,"  responded 
the  other  gently  now,  and  with  a  great  sigh  of 
relief.  Suddenly  she  came  nearer  and  touched 
Kitty's  arm.  "And  thank  you  for  saying  so," 
she  added.  "He  and  I  have  been  so  long  parted, 
and  you  have  seen  so  much  more  of  him  than  I 
have  of  late  years!  You  know  him  better — as 
he  is.  If  I  said  something  sharp  just  now,  please 
forgive  me.  I  am — indeed,  I  am  grateful  to  you 
and  your  mother." 

She  paused.  It  was  hard  for  her  to  say  what 
she  felt  she  must  say,  for  she  did  not  know  how 
her  husband  would  receive  her — he  had  done 
without  her  for  so  long;  and  she  might  need  this 
girl  and  her  mother  sorely.  The  girl  was  a 
friend  in  the  best  sense,  or  she  would  not  have 
sent  for  her.  She  must  remind  herself  of  this 
continually  lest  she  should  take  wrong  views. 

Kitty  nodded,  but  for  a  moment  she  did  not 
reply.  Her  hand  was  on  the  baize-covered  desk. 

[220] 


KITTY      SPEAKS     HER     MIND     AGAIN 

All  at  once,  with  determination  in  her  eyes,  she 
said:  "You  didn't  use  him  right  or  you'd  not 
have  been  parted  for  five  years.  You  were  rich 
and  he  was  poor, — he  is  poor  now,  though  he  may 
be  rich  any  day — and  he  wouldn't  stay  with  you 
because  he  wouldn't  take  your  money  to  live  on. 
If  you  had  been  a  real  wife  to  him  he  wouldn't 
have  seen  that  he'd  be  using  your  money;  he'd 
have  taken  it  as  though  it  was  his  own,  out  of 
the  purse  which  was  always  open  and  belonged 
to  both,  just  as  if  you  were  partners.  You  must 
feel—" 

"Hush,  for  pity's  sake,  hush !"  interrupted  the 
other. 

"You  are  going  to  see  him  again,"  Kitty  per- 
sisted. "Now,  don't  you  think  it  just  as  well  to 
know  what  the  real  truth  is1?" 

"How  do  you  know  what  is  the  truth1?"  asked 
the  trembling  little  stranger  with  a  last  attempt 
to  hold  her  position,  to  conceal  from  herself  the 
actual  facts. 

"The  Young  Doctor  and  my  mother  and  I  were 
with  him  all  the  time  he  was  ill  after  he  was  shot, 
and  the  trial  had  only  told  half  the  truth.  He 
wanted  us,  his  best  friends  here,  to  know  the 
whole  truth,  so  he  told  us  that  he  left  you  because 

[221] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

he  couldn't  bear  to  live  on  your  money.  It  was 
you  made  him  feel  that,  though  he  didn't  say  so. 
All  the  time  he  told  his  story  he  spoke  of  you  as 
though  you  were  some  goddess,  some  great 
queen — " 

A  look  of  hope,  of  wonder,  of  relief  came  into 
the  tiny  creature's  eyes.  "He  spoke  like  that  of 
me;  he  said — *?" 

"He  said  what  no  one  else  would  have  said, 
probably;  but  that's  the  way  with  people  in  love 
— they  see  what  no  one  else  sees,  they  think  what 
no  one  else  thinks.  He  talked  with  a  sort  of  hush 
in  his  voice  about  you  till  we  thought  you  must 
be  some  stately,  tall,  splendid  Helen  of  Troy 
with  a  soul  like  an  ocean,  instead  of — "  she  was 
going  to  say  something  that  would  have  seemed 
unkind,  and  she  stopped  herself  in  time — "in- 
stead of  a  sort  of  fairy,  one  of  the  little  folk  that 
never  grow  up;  the  same  as  my  father  used  to 
tell  me  about." 

"You  think  very  badly  of  me,  then1?"  returned 
the  other  with  a  sigh.  Her  courage,  her  pride, 
her  attempt  to  control  the  situation  had  vanished 
suddenly,  and  she  became  for  the  moment  almost 
the  child  she  looked. 

[222] 


KITTY      SPEAKS      HER      MIND     AGAIN 

"We've  only  just  begun.  We're  all  his 
friends  here,  and  we'll  judge  you  and  think  of 
you  according  to  what  happens  between  you  and 
him.  Ton  wrote  him  that  letter!" 

She  suddenly  placed  her  hand  on  the  desk  as 
the  inspiration  came  to  her  to  have  this  matter  of 
the  letter  out  now,  and  to  have  Mrs.  Crozier 
know  exactly  what  the  position  was,  no  matter 
what  might  be  thought  of  herself.  She  was  only 
thinking  of  Shiel  Crozier  and  his  future  now. 

"What  letter  did  I  write  ?"  There  was  real 
surprise  and  wonder  in  her  tone. 

"That  last  letter  you  wrote  to  him — the  letter 
in  which  you  gave  him  fits  for  breaking  his  prom- 
ise, and  talked  like  a  proud,  angry  angel  from  the 
top  of  the  stairs." 

"How  do  you  know  of  that  letter"?  He,  my 
husband,  told  you  what  was  in  that  letter;  he 
showed  it  to  you4?"  The  voice  was  indignant, 
low,  and  almost  rough  with  anger. 

"Yes,  your  husband  showed  me  the  letter — un- 
opened." 

"Unopened — I  do  not  understand."  Mona 
steadied  herself  against  the  foot  of  the  bed  and 
looked  in  a  helpless  way  at  Kitty.  Her  com- 

[223] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

posure  was  gone,  though  she  was  very  quiet,  and 
she  had  that  look  of  a  vital  absorption  which 
possesses  human  beings  in  crises  of  their  lives. 

Suddenly  Kitty  took  from  behind  a  book  on 
a  shelf  a  key,  opened  the  desk,  and  took  out  the 
letter  which  Crozier  had  kept  sealed  and  unopened 
all  the  years,  which  he  had  never  read. 

"Do  you  know  that?"  Kitty  said,  and  held  it 
out  for  Mrs.  Crozier  to  see. 

Two  dark-blue  eyes  stared  confusedly  at  the 
letter — at  her  own  handwriting.  Kitty  turned  it 
over.  "You  see  it  is  sealed  as  it  was  when  you 
sent  it  to  him.  He  has  never  opened  it.  He 
does  not  know  what  is  in  it." 

"He  has — kept  it — five  years — unopened," 
Mona  said  in  broken  phrases  scarce  above  a  whis- 
per. 

"He  has  never  opened  it,  as  you  see." 

"Give — give  it  to  me,"  the  wife  said,  stepping 
forward  to  stay  Kitty's  hand  as  she  opened  the 
lid  of  the  desk  to  replace  the  letter. 

"It's  not  your  letter — no,  you  shall  not,"  said 
Kitty  fiimly  as  she  jerked  aside  the  hand  laid 
upon  her  wrist,  and  threw  one  arm  on  the  lid, 
holding  it  down  as  Mrs.  Crozier  tried  to  keep  it 
open.  Then  with  a  swift  action  of  the  other 

[224.] 


KITTY      SPEAKS      HER      MIND     AGAIN 

hand  she  locked  the  desk  and  put  the  key  in  her 
pocket. 

"If  you  destroyed  this  letter  he  would  never 
believe  but  that  it  was  worse  than  it  is;  and  it  is 
a  bad  enough  letter,  Heaven  knows,  for  any 
woman  to  have  written  to  her  husband — or  to 
any  one  else's  husband.  You  thought  you  were 
the  centre  of  the  world  when  you  wrote  that  let- 
ter. Without  a  penny,  he  would  be  a  great  man, 
with  a  great  future,  but  you  are  only  a  pretty 
little  woman  with  a  fortune,  who  has  thought  a 
great  lot  of  herself,  and  far  too  much  of  herself 
only,  when  she  wrote  that  letter." 

"How  do  you  know  what  is  in  that  letter?" 
There  was  agony  and  challenge  at  once  in  the 
other's  voice. 

"Because  I  read  it — oh,  don't  look  so  shocked! 
I'd  do  it  again.  I  knew  just  how  to  act  when 
I'd  read  it.  I  steamed  it  open  and  closed  it  up 
again.  Then  I  wrote  to  you.  I'm  not  sorry  I 
did  it.  My  motive  was  a  good  one.  I  wanted 
to  help  him.  I  wanted  to  understand  everything, 
so  that  I'd  know  best  what  to  do.  Though  he's 
so  far  above  us  in  birth  and  position,  he  seemed 
in  one  way  like  our  own.  That's  the  way  it  is 
in  new  countries  like  this.  We  don't  think  of 
[  225  ] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

lots  of  things  that  you  finer  people  in  the  old 
countries  do,  and  we  don't  think  evil  till  it  trips 
us  up.  In  a  new  country  all  are  strangers  among 
the  pioneers,  and  they  have  to  come  together. 
This  town  is  only  twenty  years  old,  and  scarcely 
anybody  knew  each  other  at  the  start.  We  had 
to  take  each  other  on  trust,  and  we  think  the  best 
as  long  as  we  can.  Mr.  Crozier  came  to  live  with 
us,  and  soon  he  was  just  part  of  our  life — not  a 
boarder ;  not  some  one  staying  the  night  who  paid 
you  what  he  owed  you  in  the  morning.  He  was 
a  friend  you  could  say  your  prayers  with,  or  eat 
your  meals  with,  or  ride  a  hundred  miles  with, 
and  just  take  it  as  a  matter  of  course;  for  he  was 
part  of  what  you  were  part  of,  all  this  out  here 
— don't  you  understand*?" 

"I  am  trying  hard  to  do  so,"  was  the  reply  in 
a  hushed  voice.  Here  was  a  world,  here  were 
people  of  whom  Mona  Crozier  had  never 
dreamed.  They  were  so  much  of  an  antique 
time — far  behind  the  time  that  her  old  land  rep- 
resented; not  a  new  world,  but  the  oldest  world 
of  all.  She  began  to  understand  the  girl  also, 
and  her  face  took  on  an  understanding  look,  as 
with  eyes  like  bronze  suns  Kitty  continued: 

"So,  though  it  was  wrong — wicked — in  one 
[226] 


KITTY      SPEAKS      HER      MIND     AGAIN 

way,  I  read  the  letter,  as  a  mother  would  read 
a  letter  written  to  her  child,  to  do  the  child  some 
good  by  it,  if  it  could  be  done.  If  I  hadn't  read 
that  letter  you  wouldn't  be  here.  Was  it  worth 
while  my  doing  it1?" 

At  that  moment  there  was  a  knock  at  the  outer 
door  of  the  other  room,  or,  rather,  on  the  lintel 
of  it.  Mona  started.  Suppose  it  was  her  hus- 
band— that  was  her  thought. 

Kitty  read  the  look.  "No,  it  isn't  Mr.  Cro- 
zier.  It's  the  Young  Doctor.  I  know  his  knock. 
Will  you  come  and  see  him"?" 

The  wife  was  trembling,  she  was  very  pale, 
her  eyes  were  rather  staring,  but  she  fought  to 
control  herself.  It  was  evident  that  Kitty  ex- 
pected her  to  do  so.  It  was  also  quite  certain 
that  Kitty  meant  to  settle  things  now,  in  so  far 
as  it  could  be  done  and  in  so  far  as  the  wife  was 
concerned. 

"He  loiows  as  much  as  you  do4?"  asked  Mrs. 
Crozier. 

"He  has  not  read  the  letter  and  I  haven't  told 
him  what's  in  it;  but  he  knows  that  I  read  it, 
and  what  he  doesn't  know  he  guesses.  He  is  Mr. 
Grazier's  honest,  clever  friend.  I've  got  an  idea 
— an  invention  to  put  this  thing  right.  It's  a 
[227] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

good  one.  You'll  see.  But  I  want  the  Young 
Doctor  to  know  about  it.  He  never  has  to  think 
twice.  He  knows  what  to  do  the  very  first 
time/' 

A  moment  later  they  were  in  the  other  room, 
with  the  Young  Doctor  smiling  down  at  "the  lit- 
tle spot  of  a  woman,"  as  he  called  Crozier's  wife. 


1 228  ] 


CHAPTER  XIV 
AWAITING   THE   VERDICT 


"A/'OU  look  quite  settled  and  at  home,"  the 
A      Young  Doctor   remarked,   as  he  offered 
Mrs.  Crozier  a  chair. 

She  took  it,  for  never  in  her  life  had  she  felt 
so  small  physically  since  coming  to  the  great,  new 
land.  The  islands  where  she  was  born  wen  in 
themselves  so  miniature  that  the  minds  of  their 
people,  however  small,  were  not  made  to  feel 
insignificant.  But  her  mind,  which  was,  after  all, 
vastly  larger  in  proportion  than  the  body  enshrin- 
ing it,  felt  suddenly  that  both  were  lost  in  a  uni- 
verse. Her  impulse  was  to  let  go  and  sink  into 
the  helplessness  of  tears,  to  be  overwhelmed  by 
an  unconquerable  loneliness;  but  the  Celtic  cour- 
age in  her,  added  to  that  ancient  native  pride 
which  prevents  one  woman  from  giving  way  be- 
fore another  woman  towards  whom  she  bears  jeal- 

[229] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

ousy  or  a  desire  to  dominate,  prevented  her  from 
showing  the  weakness  she  felt.  Instead,  it 
roused  her  vanity  and  made  her  choose  to  sit 
down,  so  disguising  perceptibly  the  disparity  of 
height  which  gave  Kitty  an  advantage  over  her 
and  made  the  Young  Doctor  like  some  menacing 
Polynesian  god. 

Both  these  people  had  an  influence  and  au- 
thority in  Mona  Crozier's  life  which  was  infinitely 
greater  than  her  fortune.  Her  fortune  had  not 
kept  her  husband  beside  her  when  her  delicate 
and  perfumed  tyranny  began  to  flutter  its  ban- 
ners of  control  over  him.  Her  fortune  had 
driven  him  forth  when  her  beauty  and  her 
love  ought  to  have  kept  him  close  to  her,  no 
matter  what  fate  brought  to  their  door,  or  what 
his  misfortune  or  the  catastrophe  falling  on  him. 
It  was  all  deeply  humiliating,  and  the  inward  de- 
jection made  her  now  feel  that  her  body  was  the 
last  effort  of  a  failing  creative  power.  So  she 
sat  down  instead  of  standing  up  in  a  vain  effort 
at  retrieval. 

The  Young  Doctor  sat  down  also,  but  Kitty 

did  not,  and  she  seemed  Amazonian  to  Mona's 

eyes.    It  must  be  said  for  Kitty  that  she  remained 

standing  only  because  she  felt  she  could  not  stay 

[  230] 


AWAITING     THE      VERDICT 

fixed  to  one  spot.  A  restlessness  seized  her  which 
did  not  exist  when  she  was  in  Crozier's  room  with 
Mona.  It  was  now  as  though  something  was  go- 
ing to  happen  which  she  must  face  standing;  as 
though  something  was  coming  out  of  the  unknown 
and  forbidding  future  and  was  making  itself  felt 
before  its  time.  Her  eyes  were  almost  painfully 
bright  as  she  moved  about  the  room  doing  little 
things.  Presently  she  began  to  lay  a  cloth  and 
place  dishes  silently  on  the  table — long  before 
the  proper  time,  as  her  mother,  with  a  chid- 
ing look,  reminded  her  when  she  entered  for  a 
moment  and  then  quickly  passed  on  into  the 
kitchen,  at  a  warning  glance  from  Kitty  that 
the  Young  Doctor  and  Mona  were  not  to  be  dis- 
turbed. 

"Well,  Askatoon  is  a  place  where  one  feels  at 
home  quickly,"  added  the  Young  Doctor,  as 
Mona  did  not  at  once  respond  to  his  first  remark. 
"Every  one  who  comes  here  always  feels  as  if 
he — or  she — owns  the  place.  It's  the  way  the 
place  is  made.  The  trouble  with  most  of  us  is 
that  we  want  to  put  the  feeling  into  practice  and 
take  possession  of  'all  and  sundry.'  Isn't  that 
true,  Miss  Tynan?" 

"As  true  as  most  things  you  say,"  retorted 
[231] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

Kitty,  as  she  flicked  the  white  tablecloth.  "If 
mother  and  I  hadn't  such  wonderful  good  health 
I  suppose  you'd  come  often  enough  here  to  give 
you  real  possession.  Do  you  know,  Mrs.  Crozier," 
she  added,  with  her  wistful  eyes  vainly  trying  to 
be  merely  mischievous,  "he  once  charged  me  five 
dollars  for  torturing  me  like  a  red  Indian.  I  had 
put  my  elbow  out  of  joint,  and  he  put  it  in  again 
with  his  knee  and  both  hands,  as  though  it  was 
the  wheel  of  a  wagon  and  he  was  trying  to  put 
on  a  tire." 

"Well,  you  were  running  round  soon  after," 
answered  the  incorrigible  joker.  "But  as  for  the 
five  dollars,  I  only  took  it  to  keep  you  quiet.  So 
long  as  you  had  a  grievance  you  would  talk  in 
spite  of  everything,  and  you  never  were  so  sur- 
prised as  when  I  took  that  five  dollars." 

"I've  taken  care  never  to  dislocate  my  elbow 
since." 

"No,  not  your  elbow"  remarked  the  Young 
Doctor  dryly  and  meaningly,  and  turned  to 
Mona,  who  had  now  regained  her  composure. 

"I  sha'n't  call  you  in  to  reduce  the  dislocation 
— that's  the  medical  term,  isn't  it1?"  persisted 
Kitty,  with  fire  in  her  eyes. 

"What  is  the  dislocation*?"  asked  Mona,  with 
[232] 


AWAITING     THE      VERDICT 

a  subtle,  inquiring  look,  but  as  socially  as  though 
in  her  own  drawing-room. 

The  Young  Doctor  smiled.  "It's  only  her 
way  of  saying  that  my  mind  is  unhinged  and 
that  I  ought  to  be  sent  to  a  private  hospital  for 
two." 

"No — only  one,"  returned  Kitty. 

"Marriage  means  common  catastrophe,  doesn't 
it*?"  he  asked  quizzically. 

"Generally  it  means  that  one  only  is  perma- 
nently injured,"  replied  Kitty,  lifting  a  tumbler 
and  looking  through  it  at  him  as  though  to  see 
if  the  glass  were  properly  polished. 

Mona  was  mystified.  At  first  she  thought 
there  had  been  oblique  references  to  her  husband, 
but  these  remarks  about  marriage  would  certainly 
exclude  him.  Yet,  would  they  exclude  him? 
During  the  time  in  which  Shiel's  history  was  not 
known  might  there  not  have  been — but  no,  it 
could  not  have  been  so,  for  it  was  Kitty  who  had 
sent  the  letter  which  had  brought  her  to  Aska- 
toon. 

"Are  you  going  to  be  married — soon?"  she 
asked  of  Kitty,  with  a  friendly  yet  trembling 
smile,  for  her  agitation  was,  after  all,  troubling 
every  nerve. 

[233] 


yOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

"I've  thought  of  it  quite  lately,"  responded 
Kitty  calmly,  seating  herself  now  and  looking 
straight  into  the  eyes  of  the  woman,  who  was 
suggesting  more  truth  than  she  knew. 

"May  I  congratulate  you*?  Am  I  justified  on 
such  slight  acquaintance*?  I  am  sure  you  have 
chosen  wisely,"  was  the  smooth  rejoinder. 

Kitty  did  not  shrink  from  looking  Mona  in 
the  eyes.  "I'm  not  ready  to  receive  congratula- 
tions yet,  and  I'm  not  sure  I've  chosen  wisely. 
Some  of  my  family  strongly  disapprove-  I  car': 
help  that,  of  course,  and  I  may  have  to  elope  anc 
take  the  consequences." 

"It  takes  two  to  elope,"  interposed  the  Young 
Doctor,  who  thought  that  Kitty,  in  her  humor- 
ous extravagance,  was  treading  very  dangerous 
ground  indeed.  He  only  thought  of  Crozier  and 
Kitty;  but  Kitty  was  thinking  of  Crozier,  but 
meaning  John  Sibley.  Somehow  she  could  not 
help  playing  with  this  torturing  thing  in  the  pres- 
ence of  the  wife  of  the  man  who  was  the  real 
"man  in  possession"  so  far  as  her  life  was  con- 
cerned. 

"But  he  is  waiting  on  the  door-step,"  replied 
Kitty  daringly  and  referring  only  to  John  Sib- 
ley. 

[234] 


AWAITING     THE      VERDICT 

At  that  minute  there  was  the  crunch  of  gravel 
on  the  pathway  and  the  sound  of  a  quick  foot- 
step. Kitty  and  Mona  were  on  their  feet  at 
once.  Both  recognised  the  step  of  Shiel  Crozier. 
Presently  the  Young  Doctor  also  recognised  it, 
but  in  the  presence  of  a  situation  so  suddenly 
matured  he  rose  with  more  deliberation. 

At  that  instant  a  voice  calling  from  the  road 
arrested  Crozier's  steps  to  the  open  door  of  the 
room  where  they  were.  It  was  Jesse  Bulrush 
asking  a  question.  Crozier  paused  in  his  prog- 
ress, and  in  the  moment's  time  it  gave,  Kitty, 
with  a  swift  look  of  inquiry  and  with  a  burst  of 
the  real  soul  in  her,  caught  the  hand  of  Crozier's 
wife  and  gave  it  a  swift  pressure.  Then,  with 
a  face  flushed  and  eyes  that  determinedly  looked 
straight  ahead  of  her,  she  left  the  room  as  the 
Young  Doctor  advanced  to  the  doorway  and 
stepped  outside.  Within  ten  feet  of  the  door  he 
met  Crozier. 

"How  goes  it,  patient*?"  he  said,  standing  in 
Crozier's  way.  Being  a  man  who  thought  much 
and  wisely  for  other  people,  he  wanted  to  give 
the  wife  time  to  gather  herself  together. 

"Right  enough  in  your  sphere  of  operations," 
answered  Crozier. 

[235] 


YOU   NE-VER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"And  not  so  right  in  other  fields,  eh4?" 
"I've  come  back  after  a  fruitless  hunt. 
They've  got  me,  the  thieves!"  said  Crozier,  with 
a  look  which  gave  his  long  face  an  almost  tragic 
austerity.  Then  suddenly  the  look  changed,  the 
mediaeval  remoteness  passed,  and  a  thought 
flashed  up  into  his  eyes  which  made  his  expres- 
sion alive  with  humour. 

"Isn't  it  wonderful  that  just  when  a  man  feels 
he  wants  a  rope  to  hang  himself  with,  the  rope 
isn't  to  be  had?"  he  exclaimed.  "Before  he  can 
lay  his  hands  on  it  he  wants  to  hang  somebody 
else,  and  then  he  has  to  pause  whether  he  will 
or  no.  Did  I  ever  tell  you  the  story  of  the  old 
Irishwoman  who  lived  down  at  Kenmare,  in 
County  Kerry*?  Well,  she  used  to  sit  at  her 
doorway  and  lament  the  sorrows  of  the  world 
with  a  depth  of  passion  that  you'd  think  never 
could  be  assuaged.  'Oh,  I  fale  so  bad,  I  am  so 
wake — oh,  I  do  fale  so  bad,'  she  used  to  say.  'I 
wish  some  wan  would  take  me  by  the  ear  and 
lade  me  round  to  the  ould  shebeen,  and  set  me 
down,  and  fill  a  noggen  of  whisky  and  make  me 
dhrink  it — whether  I  would  or  no!'  Whether 
I  would  or  no  I  have  to  drink  the  cup  of  self- 
denial,"  Crozier  continued,  "though  Bradley  and 

[236] 


AWAITING     THE      VERDICT 

his  gang  have  closed  every  door  against  me  here, 
and  I've  come  back  without  what  I  went  for  at 
Aspen  Vale,  for  my  men  were  away.  I've  come 
back  without  what  I  went  for,  but  I  must  just 
grin  and  bear  it."  He  shrugged  his  shoulders 
and  gave  a  great  sigh. 

"Perhaps  you'll  find  what  you  went  for  here," 
returned  the  Young  Doctor  meaningly. 

"There's  a  lot  here — enough  to  make  a  man 
think  life  worth  while" — inside  the  room  the  wife 
shrank  at  the  words,  for  she  could  hear  all — "but 
I'm  not  thinking  the  thing  I  went  to  look  for  is 
here  just  the  same." 

"You  never  know  your  luck,"  was  the  reply. 
"  'Ask  and  you  shall  find,  knock  and  it  shall  be 
opened  unto  you' !" 

The  long  face  blazed  up  with  humour  again. 
"Do  you  mean  that  I  haven't  asked  you  yet1?" 
Crozier  remarked,  with  a  quizzical  look,  which 
had  still  that  faint  hope  against  hope  which  is 
a  painful  thing  for  a  good  man's  eyes  to  see. 

The  Young  Doctor  laid  a  hand  on  Crozier's 
arm.  "No,  I  didn't  mean  that,  patient.  I'm  in 
that  state  when  every  penny  I  have  is  out  to  keep 
me  from  getting  a  fall.  I'm  in  that  Starwhon 
coal  mine  down  at  Bethbridge,  and  it's  like  a 
[237] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

suction-pump.  I  couldn't  borrow  a  thousand 
dollars  myself  now — I  can't,  or  I'd  stand  in  with 
you,  Crozier.  No,  I  can't  help  you  a  bit;  but 
step  inside.  There's  a  room  in  this  house  where 
you  got  back  your  life  by  the  help  of  a  knife. 
There's  another  room  in  there  where  you  may 
get  back  your  fortune  by  the  help  of  a  wife." 

Stepping  aside  he  gave  the  wondering  Crozier 
a  slight  push  forward  into  the  doorway,  then 
left  him  and  hurried  round  to  the  back  of  the 
house,  where  he  hoped  he  might  see  Kitty. 

The  Young  Doctor  found  Kitty  pumping 
water  on  a  pail  of  potatoes  and  stirring  them  with 
a  broom-handle. 

"A  most  unscientific  way  of  cleaning  potatoes," 
he  said,  as  Kitty  did  not  look  at  him.  "If  you 
put  them  in  a  trough  where  the  water  could  run 
off,  the  dirt  would  go  with  the  water,  and  you 
wouldn't  waste  time  and  intelligence,  and  your 
fingers  would  be  cleaner  in  the  end." 

The  only  reply  Kitty  made  was  to  flick  the 
broom-head  at  him.  It  had  been  dipped  in  water 
and  the  spray  from  it  slightly  spattered  his  face. 

"Will  you  never  grow  up1?"  he  exclaimed  as 
he  applied  a  handkerchief  to  his  ruddy  face. 

[238] 


AWAITING     THE      VERDICT 

"I'd  like  you  so  much  better  if  you  were 
younger — will  you  never  be  young *?"  she  asked. 

"It  makes  a  man  old  before  his  time  to  have 
to  meet  you  day  by  day  and  live  near  you." 

"Why  don't  you  try  living  with  me1?"  she  re- 
torted. 

"Ah,  then,  you  meant  me  when  you  said  to 
Mrs.  Crozier  that  you  were  going  to  be  married? 
Wasn't  that  a  bit  'momentary,'  as  my  mother's 
cook  used  to  remark.  I  think  we  haven't  'kept 
company' — you  and  I." 

"It's  true  you  haven't  been  a  beau  of  mine — 
but  I'd  rather  marry  you  than  be  obliged  to  live 
with  you,"  was  the  paradoxical  retort. 

"You  have  me  this  time,"  he  said,  trying  in 
vain  to  solve  her  reply. 

Kitty  tossed  her  head.  "No,  I  haven't  got 
you  this  time,  thank  Heaven,  and  I  don't  want 
you;  but  I'd  rather  marry  you  than  live  with 
you,  as  I  said.  Isn't  it  the  custom  for  really 
nice-minded  people  to  marry  to  get  rid  of  each 
other — for  five  years,  or  for  ever  and  ever  and 
ever." 

"What  a  girl  you  are,  Kitty  Tynan!"  he  said 
reprovingly.  He  saw  that  she  meant  Crozier 
and  his  wife. 

[239] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

Kitty  ceased  her  work  for  an  instant  and,  look- 
ing away  from  him  into  the  distance,  said: 
"Three  people  said  those  same  words  to  me  all 
in  one  day  a  thousand  years  ago.  It  was  Mr. 
Crozier,  Jesse  Bulrush,  and  my  mother;  and  now 
you've  said  it  a  thousand  years  after;  as  with 
your  inexpensive  education  and  slow  mind  you'd 
be  sure  to  do." 

"I  have  an  idea  that  Mrs.  Crozier  said  the 
same  to  you  also  this  very  day.  Did  she — come, 
did  she?" 

"She  didn't  say,  'What  a  girl  you  are,'  but  in 
her  mind  she  probably  did  say,  'What  a  vixen  you 
are.'  " 

The  Young  Doctor  nodded  satirically.  "If 
you  continued  as  you  began  when  coming  from 
the  station,  I'm  sure  she  did;  and  also  I'm  sure 
it  wasn't  wrong  of  her  to  say  it." 

"I  wanted  her  to  say  it.  That's  why  I  uttered 
the  too,  too  utter-things,  as  the  comic-opera  says. 
What  else  was  there  to  do"?  I  had  to  help  cure 
her." 

"To  cure  her  of  what,  miss?" 

"To  cure  her  of  herself,  doctor-man." 

The  Young  Doctor's  look  became  graver.  He 
wondered  greatly  at  this  young  girl's  sage  instinct 
[240] 


AWAITING     THE     VERDICT 

and  penetration.  "Of  herself?  Ah,  yes,  to 
think  more  of  some  one  else  than  herself!  That 
is—" 

"Yes,  that  is  love,"  Kitty  answered,  her  head 
bent  over  the  pail  and  stirring  the  potatoes  hard. 

"I  suppose  it  is,"  he  answered. 

"I  know  it  is,"  she  returned. 

"Is  that  why  you  are  going  to  be  married*?"  he 
asked  quizzically. 

"It  will  probably  cure  the  man  I  marry  of 
himself,"  she  retorted.  "Oh,  neither  of  us 
know  what  we  are  talking  about — let's  change 
the  subject!"  she  added  impatiently  now,  with 
a  change  of  mood,  as  she  poured  the  water  off  the 
potatoes. 

There  was  a  moment's  silence  in  which  they 
were  both  thinking  of  the  same  thing.  "I  won- 
der how  it's  all  going  inside  there?"  he  remarked. 
"I  hope  all  right,  but  I  have  my  doubts." 

"I  haven't  any  doubt  at  all.  It  isn't  going 
right,"  she  answered  ruefully;  "but  it  has  to  be 
made  go  right." 

"Whom  do  you  think  can  do  that?" 

Kitty  looked  him  frankly  and  decisively  in  the 
eyes.  Her  eyes  had  the  look  of  a  dreaming 
pietist  for  the  moment.  The  deep-sea  soul  of 
[241] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

her  was  awake.  "I  can  do  it  if  they  don't  break 
away  altogether  at  once.  I  helped  her  more  than 
you  think.  I  told  her  I  had  opened  that  letter." 

He  gasped.  "My  dear  girl — that  letter — you 
told  her  you  had  done  such  a  thing,  such — !" 

"Don't  dear  girl  me,  if  you  please.  I  know 
what  I  am  doing.  I  told  her  that  and  a  great 
deal  more.  She  won't  leave  this  house  the 
woman  she  was  yesterday.  She  is  having  a  quick 
cure — a  cure  while  you  wait." 

"Perhaps  he  is  cured  of  her,"  remarked  the 
Young  Doctor  very  gravely. 

"No,  no,  the  disease  might  have  got  headway, 
but  it  didn't,"  Kitty  returned,  her  face  turned 
away.  "He  became  a  little  better;  but  he  was 
never  cured.  That's  the  way  with  a  man.  He 
can  never  forget  a  woman  he  has  once  cared  for, 
and  he  can  go  back  to  her  half  loving  her;  but 
it  isn't  the  case  with  a  woman.  There's  nothing 
so  dead  to  a  woman  as  a  man  when  she's  cured 
of  him.  The  woman  is  never  dead  to  the  man, 
no  matter  what  happens." 

The  Young  Doctor  regarded  her  with  a 
strange,  new  interest  and  a  puzzled  surprise. 
"Sappho — Sappho,  I  wonder  how  it  is  you  know 
these  things,"  he  exclaimed.  "You  are  only  a 

[242] 


AWAITING     THE      VERDICT 

girl  at  best,  or  something  of  a  boy-girl  at  worst, 
and  yet  you  have,  or  think  you  have,  got  into 
those  places  which  are  reserved  for  the  old-timers 
in  life's  game.  You  talk  like  an  ancient  dame." 

Kitty  smiled,  but  her  eyes  had  a  slumbering 
look  as  if  she  was  half-dreaming.  "That's  the 
mistake  most  of  you  make — men  and  women. 
There's  such  a  thing  as  instinct,  and  there's  such 
a  thing  as  keeping  your  eyes  open." 

"What  did  Mrs.  Crozier  say  when  you  told 
her  about  opening  that  five-year-old  letter1?  Did 
she  hate  you?" 

Kitty  nodded  with  wistful  whimsicality. 
"For  a  minute  she  was  like  an  industrious  hornet. 
Then  I  made  her  see  she  wouldn't  have  been  here 
at  all  if  I  hadn't  opened  it.  That  made  her  come 
down  from  her  high  horse,  and  she  said  that,  con- 
sidering my  opportunities,  I  was  not  so  much  of 
an  aboriginal  after  all." 

"Now,  look  you,  Sapphira,  prospective  wife  of 
Ananias,  she  didn't  say  that  of  course.  Still  it 
doesn't  matter,  does  it*?  The  point  is,  suppose 
he  opens  that  letter  now." 

"If  he  does,  he'll  probably  not  go  with  her. 
It  was  a  letter  that  would  send  a  man  out  with 
a  scalping-knife.  Still  if  Mr.  Crozier  had  his 

[243] 


yOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

land-deal  through  he  might  not  read  the  letter 
as  it  really  is.  His  brain  wouldn't  then  be  grasp- 
ing what  his  eyes  saw." 

"He  hasn't  got  his  land-deal  through.  He 
told  me  so  just  now  before  he  saw  her." 

"Then  it's  ora  pro  nobis — it's  pray  for  us 
hard,"  rejoined  Kitty  sorrowfully.  "Poor  man 
from  County  Kerry!" 

At  that  moment  Mrs.  Tynan  came  from  the 
house,  her  face  flushed,  her  manner  slightly  agi- 
tated. "John  Sibley  is  here,  Kitty — with  two 
saddle-horses.  He  says  you  promised  to  ride 
with  him  to-day." 

"I  probably  did,"  responded  Kitty  calmly. 
"It's  a  good  day  for  riding,  too.  But  John  will 
have  to  wait.  Please  tell  him  to  come  back  at 
six  o'clock.  There'll  be  plenty  of  time  for  an 
hour's  ride  before  sundown." 

"Are  you  lame,  dear  child*?"  asked  her  mother 
ironically.  "Because  if  you're  not,  perhaps 
you'll  be  your  own  messenger.  It's  no  way  to 
treat  a  friend — or  whatever  you  like  to  call  him." 

Kitty  smiled  tenderly  at  her  mother.  "Then 
would  you  mind  telling  him  to  come  here,  mother 
darling4?  I'm  giving  this  doctor-man  a  prescrip- 
tion. Ah,  please  do  what  I  ask  you,  mother! 
[  2-14  ] 


AWAITING     THE      VERDICT 

It  is  true  about  the  prescription.  It's  not  for 
himself;  it's  for  the  foreign  people  quarantined 
inside."  She  nodded  towards  the  room  where 
Shiel  Crozier  and  his  wife  were  shaping  their 
fate. 

As  her  mother  disappeared  with  a  gesture  of 
impatience  and  the  remark  that  she  washed  her 
hands  of  the  whole  Sibley  business,  the  Young 
Doctor  said  to  Kitty:  "What  is  your  prescrip- 
tion, Mademoiselle  Sapphira?  Suppose  they 
come  out  of  quarantine  with  a  clean  bill  of 
health?' 

"If  they  do  that  you  needn't  make  up  the  pre- 
scription. But  if  Aspen  Vale  hasn't  given  him 
what  he  wanted,  then  Mr.  Shiel  Crozier  will  still 
be  an  exile  from  home  and  the  angel  in  the 
house." 

"What  is  the  prescription?  Out  with  your 
Sibylline  leaves !" 

"It's  in  that  unopened  letter.  When  the  let- 
ter is  opened  you'll  see  it  effervesce  like  a  seidlitz 
powder." 

"But  suppose  I  am  not  here  when  the  letter 
is  opened?"  he  questioned. 

"You  must  be  here — you  must.  You'll  stay 
now,  if  you  please." 

[245] 


"I'm  afraid  I  can't.    I  have  patients  waiting." 

Kitty  made  an  impetuous  gesture  of  command. 
"There  are  two  patients  here  who  are  at  the  crisis 
of  their  disease.  You  may  be  wanted  to  save 
a  life  any  minute  now." 

"I  thought  that  with  your  prescription  you 
were  to  be  the  Esculapius." 

"No,  I'm  only  going  to  save  the  reputation 
of  Esculapius  by  giving  him  a  prescription  got 
from  a  quack  and  given  to  a  goose." 

"Come,  come,  no  names.  You  are  incorrigible. 
I  believe  you'd  have  your  joke  on  your  death- 
bed." 

"I  should  if  you  were  there.  I  should  die 
laughing,"  Kitty  retorted. 

"There  will  be  no  death-bed  for  you,  miss. 
You'll  be  translated — no,  that's  not  right:  no 
one  could  translate  you." 

"God  might — or  a  man  I  loved  well  enough 
not  to  marry  him!" 

There  was  a  note  of  emotion  in  her  laugh  as 
she  uttered  the  words.  It  did  not  escape  the  ear 
of  the  Young  Doctor,  who  regarded  her  fixedly 
for  a  moment  before  he  said:  "I'm  not  sure  that 
even  He  would  be  able  to  translate  you.  You 
speak  your  own  language,  and  it's  surely  orig- 

[246] 


AWAITING     THE      VERDICT 

inal.  I  am  only  just  learning  its  alphabet.  No 
one  else  speaks  it.  I  have  a  fear  that  you'll  be 
terribly  lonely  as  you  travel  along  the  trail,  Kitty 
Tynan." 

A  light  of  pleasure  came  into  Kitty's  eyes, 
though  her  face  was  a  little  drawn.  "You  really 
do  think  I'm  original — that  I'm  myself  and  not 
like  anybody  else*?"  she  asked  him  with  a  child- 
like eagerness. 

"Almost  more  than  any  one  I  ever  met,"  an- 
swered the  Young  Doctor  gently;  for  he  saw  that 
she  had  her  own  great  troubles,  and  he  also  saw 
now  fully  what  this  comedy  or  tragedy  inside  the 
house  meant  to  her.  "But  you're  terribly  lonely 
— and  that's  why:  because  you  are  the  only  one 
of  your  kind." 

"No,  that's  why  I'm  not  going  to  be  lonely," 
she  said,  nodding  towards  the  corner  of  the  house 
where  John  Sibley  appeared. 

Suddenly,  with  a  gesture  of  confidence  and  al- 
most of  affection,  she  laid  a  hand  on  the  Young 
Doctor's  breast.  "I've  left  the  trail,  doctor-man. 
I'm  cutting  across  the  prairie.  Perhaps  I  shall 
reach  camp  and  perhaps  I  sha'n't;  but  anyhow 
I'll  know  that  I  met  one  good  man  on  the  way. 
And  I  also  saw  a  rest-house  that  I'd  like  to  have 
[247] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR   LUCK 

stayed  at;  but  the  blinds  were  drawn  and  the  door 
was  locked." 

There  was  a  strange,  eerie  look  in  her  face 
again  as  her  eyes  of  soft  umber  dwelt  on  his  for 
a  moment;  then  she  turned  with  a  gay  smile  to 
John  Sibley,  who  had  seen  her  hand  on  the 
Young  Doctor's  chest  without  dismay;  for  the 
joy  of  Kitty  was  that  she  hid  nothing,  and,  any- 
how, the  Young  Doctor  had  a  place  of  his  own; 
and  also,  anyhow,  Kitty  did  what  she  pleased. 
Once  when  she  had  visited  the  Coast  the  Gov- 
ernor had  talked  to  her  with  great  gusto  and 
friendliness;  and  she  had  even  gone  so  far  as  to 
touch  his  arm  while,  chuckling  at  her  whimsical- 
ity, he  listened  to  a  story  she  told  him  of  life  at 
the  rail-head.  And  the  Governor  had  patted  her 
fingers  in  quite  a  fatherly  way — or  not,  as  the 
mind  of  the  observer  saw  it;  while  subsequently 
his  secretary  had  written  verses  to  her. 

"So  you've  been  gambling  again — you've 
broken  your  promise  to  me,"  she  said  reprovingly 
to  Sibley,  but  with  that  wonderful,  wistful 
laughter  in  her  eyes. 

Sibley  looked  at  her  in  astonishment.  "Who 
told  you*?"  he  asked.  It  had  only  happened  the 

[248] 


AWAITING     THE      VERDICT 

night  before,  and  it  didn't  seem  possible  she  could 
know. 

He  was  quite  right.  It  wasn't  possible  she 
could  know,  and  she  didn't  know.  She  only  di- 
vined. 

"I  knew  when  you  made  the  promise  you 
couldn't  keep  it;  that's  why  I  forgive  you  now," 
she  added.  "Knowing  what  I  did  about  you,  I 
oughtn't  to  have  let  you  make  it." 

The  Young  Doctor  saw  in  her  words  a  mean- 
ing that  John  Sibley  could  never  have  guessed 
or  understood,  for  it  was  a  part  of  the  story  of 
Crozier's  life  reproduced — and  with  what  a  dif- 
ferent ending! 


[249] 


CHAPTER  XV 

MALE   AND    FEMALE    CRE- 
ATED   HE   THEM" 


WHEN  Crozier  stepped  out  of  the  bright 
sunlight  into  the  shady  living-room  of 
the  Tynan  home,  his  eyes  were  clouded  by  the 
memory  of  his  conference  with  Studd  Bradley  and 
his  financial  associates,  and  by  the  desolate  feel- 
ing that  the  five  years  since  he  had  left  England 
had  brought  him  nothing — nothing  at  all  except 
a  new  manhood.  But  that  he  did  not  count  an 
asset,  because  he  had  not  himself  taken  account 
of  this  new  capital.  He  had  never  been  a  vain 
or  an  introspective  man  in  the  philosophic  sense, 
and  he  never  had  thought  that  he  was  of  much 
account.  He  had  lived  long  on  his  luck,  and 
nothing  had  come  of  it — "nothing  at  all,  at  all," 
as  he  said  to  himself  when  he  stepped  inside  the 
room  where,  unknown  to  him,  his  wife  awaited 
[250] 


CREATED     HE 


him.  So  abstracted  was  he,  so  disturbed  was  his 
gaze  (fixed  on  the  inner  thing)  that  he  did  not 
see  the  figure  in  blue  and  white  over  against  the 
wall,  her  hand  on  the  big  armchair  once  belong- 
ing to  Tyndall  Tynan,  and  now  used  always  by 
Shiel  Crozier,  "the  white-haired  boy  of  the  Ty- 
nan sanatorium,"  as  Jesse  Bulrush  had  called 
him. 

There  was  a  strange  timidity,  and  a  fear  not 
so  strange,  in  Mona's  eyes  as  she  saw  her  husband 
enter  with  that  quick  step  which  she  had  so  long- 
ingly remembered  after  he  had  fled  from  her;  but 
of  which  she  had  taken  less  account  when  he  was 
with  her  at  Lammis  long  ago — when  Crozier  of 
Lammis  was  with  her  long  ago.  How  tall  and 
shapely  he  was!  How  large  he  loomed  with  the 
light  behind  him!  How  shadowed  his  face  and 
how  distant  the  look  in  his  eyes! 

Somehow  the  room  seemed  too  small  for  him, 
and  yet  he  had  lived  in  this  very  house  for  four 
years  and  more,  he  had  slept  in  the  next  room 
all  that  time,  had  eaten  at  this  table  and  sat  in 
this  very  chair — Mrs.  Tynan  had  told  her  that 
— for  this  long  time,  like  the  master  of  a  house- 
hold. With  that  far-away,  brooding  look  in  his 
face,  he  seemed  in  one  sense  as  distant  from  her 

[251] 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

as  when  she  was  in  London  in  those  dreary,  deso- 
late years  with  no  knowledge  of  his  whereabouts, 
a  widow  in  every  sense  save  one;  but  in  her  acts 
— that  had  to  be  said  for  her — a  wife  always  and 
not  a  widow.  She  had  not  turned  elsewhere, 
though  there  had  been  temptation  enough  to  do  so. 
Crozier  advanced  to  the  centre  of  the  room, 
even  to  the  table  laid  for  dinner,  before  he  was 
conscious  of  some  one  in  the  room,  of  a  figure 
by  the  chair.  For  a  moment  he  stood  still, 
startled  as  if  he  had  seen  a  vision,  and  his  sight 
became  blurred.  When  it  cleared,  Mona  was  a 
step  nearer  to  him,  and  then  he  saw  her  clearly, 
He  caught  his  breath  as  though  life  had  burst 
upon  him  with  some  staggering  revelation.  If 
she  had  been  a  woman  of  genius,  as  in  her  way 
Kitty  Tynan  was,  she  would  have  spoken  before 
he  had  a  chance  to  do  so.  Instead,  she  wished 
to  see  how  he  would  greet  her,  to  hear  what  he 
would  say.  She  was  afraid  of  him  now.  It  was 
not  her  gift  to  do  the  right  thing  by  perfect  in- 
stinct; she  had  to  think  things  out;  and  so  she 
did  now.  But  it  has  to  be  said  for  her  that  she 
also  had  a  strange,  deep  sense  of  apprehension 
and  anxiety  in  the  presence  of  the  man  whose 
arms  had  held  her  fast,  and  then  let  her  go  for  so 
[252] 


CREATED      HE 


bitter  a  length  of  time,  in  which  her  pride  was 
lacerated  and  her  heart  brought  low.  She  did 
not  know  how  she  was  going  to  be  met  now,  and 
a  womanly  shyness  held  her  back.  If  she  had 
said  one  word — his  name  only — it  might  have 
made  a  world  of  difference  to  them  both  at  that 
moment;  for  he  was  tortured  by  failure,  and  at 
the  moment  when  hope  was  gone,  here  was  the 
woman  whom  he  had  left  in  order  to  force  gifts 
from  fate  to  bring  himself  back  to  her. 

"You — you  here!"  he  exclaimed  hoarsely. 
He  did  not  open  his  arms  to  her  or  go  a  step 
nearer  to  her.  His  look  was  that  of  blank 
amazement,  of  confusion,  of  mingled  memory  and 
stark  realisation.  This  was  a  turn  of  affairs 
for  which  he  had  made  no  calculation.  There 
had  ever  been  the  question  of  his  return  to  her, 
but  never  of  her  coming  to  him.  Yet  here  she 
was  debonnaire  and  fresh  and  perfectly  appointed 
— and  ah,  so  terribly  neat  and  spectacularly  fi- 
nessed! Here  she  was  with  all  that  expert 
formality  which,  in  the  old  days,  had  been  a 
reproach  to  his  loosely-swung  life  and  person, 
to  his  careless,  almost  slovenly  but  well-brushed, 
cleanly  and  polished  ease — not  like  his  wife,  as 
though  he  had  been  poured  out  of  a  mould  and 

[253] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

set  up  to  dry.  He  was  not  tailor-made,  and  she 
had  ever  been  so  exact  that  it  was  as  though  she 
had  been  crystallised,  clothes  and  all — a  perfect 
crystal,  yet  a  crystal.  It  was  this  very  perfec- 
tion, so  charming  to  see,  but  in  a  sense  so  in- 
human, which  had  ever  dismayed  him.  "What 
should  I  be  doing  in  the  home  of  an  angel!"  he 
had  exclaimed  to  himself  in  the  old  home  at  Lam- 
mis. 

Truth  is,  he  ought  never  to  have  had  such  a 
feeling,  and  he  would  not  have  had  it,  if  she  had 
diffused  the  radiance  of  love,  which  would  have 
made  her  outer  perfectness  mere  slovenliness  be- 
side her  inner  charm  and  magnetism.  Very  lit- 
tle of  all  this  passed  through  Crozier's  mind,  as 
with  confused  vision  he  looked  at  her.  He  had 
borne  the  ordeal  of  the  witness-box  in  the  Logan 
Trial  with  superb  coolness ;  he  had  been  in  physi- 
cal danger  over  and  over  again,  and  had  kept 
his  head;  he  had  never  been  faced  by  a  human 
being  who  embarrassed  him — except  his  own 
wife.  "There  is  no  fear  like  that  of  one's  own 
wife"  was  the  saying  of  an  ancient  philosopher, 
and  Crozier  had  proved  it  true;  not  because  of 
errors  committed,  but  because  he  was  as  sensitive 
as  a  girl  of  sensibility;  because  he  felt  that  his 

[254] 


You  —  YOU  HERE! 


CREATED      HE 


wife  did  not  understand  him,  and  he  was  ever 
in  fear  of  doing  the  wrong  thing,  while  eager 
beyond  telling  to  please  her.  After  all,  during 
the  past  five  years,  parted  from  her  while  loving 
her,  there  had  still  been  a  feeling  of  relief  un- 
explainable  to  himself  in  not  having  to  think 
whether  he  was  pleasing  her  or  not,  or  to  reproach 
himself  constantly  that  he  was  failing  to  conform 
to  her  standard. 

"How  did  you  come — why*?  How  did  3^ou 
know'?"  he  asked  helplessly,  as  she  made  no  mo- 
tion to  come  nearer;  as  she  kept  looking  at  him 
with  an  expression  in  her  eyes  wholly  unfamiliar 
to  him — yet  not  wholly  unfamiliar,  for  it  ap- 
peared to  belong  somehow  to  the  days  when  he 
courted  her,  when  she  seemed  to  have  got  nearer 
to  him  than  in  the  more  intimate  relations  of 
married  life. 

"Is — is  that  all  you  have  to  say  to  me,  Shield" 
she  asked,  with  a  swelling  note  of  feeling  in  her 
voice;  while  there  was  also  emerging  in  her  look 
elusive  pride  which  might  quickly  become  sharp 
indignation.  That  her  deserter  should  greet  her 
so  after  five  years  of  such  offence  to  a  woman's 
self-respect,  as  might  entitle  her  to  become  a  rebel 
against  man  and  matrimony,  was  too  cruel  to  be 

[255] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR   LUCK 

borne.  This  feeling  suddenly  became  alive  in 
her,  in  spite  of  a  joy  in  her  heart  different  from 
that  which  she  had  ever  known;  in  defiance  of 
the  fact  that  now  that  they  were  together  once 
more,  what  would  she  not  do  to  prevent  their 
being  driven  apart  again! 

"After  abandoning  me  for  five  years,  is  that 
all  you  have  to  say  to  me,  Shiel*?  After  I  have 
suffered  before  the  world — " 

He  threw  up  his  arms  with  a  passionate  ges- 
ture. "The  world,"  he  exclaimed — "the  devil 
take  the  world !  I've  been  out  of  it  for  five  years, 
and  well  out  of  it.  What  do  I  care  for  the 
world!" 

She  drew  herself  up  in  a  spirit  of  defence.  "It 
isn't  what  you  care  for  the  world,  but  I  had  to 
live  in  it — alone,  and  because  I  was  alone,  I  was 
sneered  at.  It  has  been  easy  enough  for  you — 
you  were  where  no  one  knew  you.  You  had  your 
freedom" — she  advanced  to  the  table  and,  as 
though  unconsciously,  he  did  the  same,  and  they 
gazed  at  each  other  over  the  white  linen  and  its 
furnishings — "and  no  one  was  saying  that  your 
wife  had  left  you  for  this  or  that,  because  of  her 
bad  conduct  or  of  yours.  Either  way  it  was  not 
[256] 


CREATED      HE 


what  was  fair  and  just;  yet  I  had  to  bear  and 
suffer,  not  you.  There  is  no  pain  like  it.  There 
I  was  in  misery  and — " 

A  bitter  smile  came  to  his  lips.  "A  woman  can 
endure  a  good  deal  when  she  has  all  life's  luxuries 
in  her  grasp.  Did  you  ever  think,  Mona,  that 
a  man  must  suffer  as  much  as  can  be  endured 
when  he  goes  out  into  a  world  where  he  knows 
no  one,  penniless,  with  no  trade,  no  profession, 
nothing  except  his  own  helpless  self?  He  might 
have  stayed  behind  among  the  luxuries  that  be- 
longed to  another,  and  eaten  from  the  hand  of  his 
wife's  charity,  but"  (all  the  pride  and  pain  of  the 
old  situation  rose  up  in  him,  impelled  by  the 
brooding  of  the  years  of  separation,  heightened 
by  the  fact  that  he  was  no  nearer  to  his  goal  of 
financial  independence  of  her  than  he  was  when 
he  left  London  five  years  before) — "why,  do  you 
think,  no  matter  what  I've  done,  broken  a  pledge 
or  not,  been  in  the  wrong  a  thousand  times  as 
much  as  I  was,  that  I'd  be  fed  by  the  hand  of  one 
to  whom  I  had  given  a  pledge  and  broken  it? 
Do  you  think  that  I'd  give  her  the  chance  to  say 
aloud  or  to  herself,  day  by  day,  CI  forgive  you; 
I  will  give  you  your  food  and  clothes  and  board 
[257] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

and  bed,  but  if  you  are  not  good  in  the  future,  I 
will  be  very,  very  angry  with  you.'  Do  you 
think—?' 

His  face  was  flaming  now.  The  pent-up-flood 
of  remorse  and  resentment  and  pride  and  love — 
the  love  that  tore  itself  in  pieces  because  it 
had  not  the  pride  and  self-respect  which  independ- 
ence as  to  money  gives — broke  forth  in  him, 
fresh  as  he  was  from  a  brutal  interview  with  the 
financial  clique  whom  he  had  given  the  chance  to 
make  much  money,  and  who  were  now,  for  a  few 
thousand  dollars,  trying  to  cudgel  him  out  of  his 
one  opportunity  to  regain  a  lost  place  in  his  lost 
world. 

"I  live — I  live  like  this,"  he  continued,  with 
a  gesture  that  embraced  the  room  where  they 
were,  "and  I  have  one  room  to  myself  where  I 
have  lived 'over  four  years" — he  pointed  to  it. 
"Do  you  think  I  would  choose  this  and  all  it 
means — its  poverty  and  its  crudeness,  its  distance 
from  all  I  ever  had  and  all  my  people  had,  if  I 
could  have  stood  the  other  thing — a  pauper  tak- 
ing pennies  from  his  own  wife"?  I  had  had  taste 
enough  of  it  while  I  had  a  little  something  left; 
but  when  I  lost  everything  on  Flamingo,  and  I 
was  a  beggar,  I  knew  I  could  not  stand  the  whole 

[258] 


CREATED      HE      THEM 


thing.  I  could  not,  would  not,  go  under  the  poor- 
law  and  accept  you,  with  the  lash  of  a  broken 
pledge  in  your  hand,  as  my  guardian.  So  that's 
why  I  left,  and  that's  why  I  stay  here,  and  that's 
why  I'm  going  to  stay  here,  Mona." 

He  looked  at  her  firmly,  though  his  face  had 
that  illumination  which  the  spirit  in  his  eyes — 
the  Celtic  fire  drawn  through  the  veins  of  his 
ancestors  gave  to  all  he  did  and  felt;  and  now 
as  in  a  dream  he  saw  little  things  in  her  he  had 
never  seen  before.  He  saw  that  a  little  strand 
of  her  beautiful  dark  hair  had  broken  away  from 
its  ordered  place  and  hung  prettily  against  the 
rosy,  fevered  skin  of  her  cheek  just  beside  her  ear. 
He  saw  that  there  were  no  rings  on  her  fingers 
save  one,  and  that  was  her  wedding-ring — and 
she  had  always  been  fond  of  wearing  rings.  He 
noted  involuntarily  that  in  her  agitation  the  white 
tulle  at  her  bosom  had  been  disturbed  into  pretty 
disarray,  and  that  there  was  neither  brooch  nor 
necklace  at  her  breast  or  throat. 

"If  you  stay,  I  am  going  to  stay,  too,"  she  de- 
clared in  an  even  yet  almost  passionate  voice,  and 
she  spoke  with  deliberation  and  a  look  which  left 
no  way  open  to  doubt.  She  was  now  a  valiant 
little  figure  making  a  fight  for  happiness. 

[259] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"I  can't  prevent  that,"  he  responded  stub- 
bornly. 

She  made  a  quick,  appealing  motion  of  her 
hands.  "Would  you  prevent  it1?  Aren't  you 
glad  to  see  me?  Don't  you  love  me  any  more*? 
You  used  to  love  me.  In  spite  of  all,  you  used 
to  love  me.  Even  though  you  hated  my  money 
and  I  hated  your  gambling — your  betting  on 
horses.  You  used  to  love  me — I  was  sure  you 
did  then.  Don't  you  love  me  now,  Shiel*?" 

A  gloomy  look  passed  over  his  face.  Memory 
of  other  days  was  admonishing  him.  "What  is 
the  good  of  one  loving  when  the  other  doesn't"? 
And,  anyhow,  I  made  up  my  mind  five  years  ago 
that  I  would  not  live  on  my  wife.  I  haven't 
done  so,  and  I  don't  mean  to  do  so.  I  don't  mean 
to  take  a  penny  of  your  money.  I  should  curse 
it  to  damnation  if  I  was  living  on  it.  I'm  not, 
and  I  don't  mean  to  do  so." 

"Then  I'll  stay  here  and  work,  too,  without 
it,"  she  urged,  with  a  light  in  her  eyes  which  they 
had  never  known. 

He  laughed  mirthlessly.  "What  could  you 
do*? — you  never  did  a  day's  work  in  your  life!" 

"You  could  teach  me  how,  Shiel." 
[260] 


CREATED      HE      THEM 


His  jaw  jerked  in  a  way  it  had  when  he  was 
incredulous.  "You  used  to  say  I  was  only — 
mark  you,  only  a  dreamer  and  a  sportsman. 
Well,  I'm  no  longer  a  dreamer  and  a  sportsman; 
I'm  a  practical  man.  I've  done  with  dreaming 
and  sportsmanship.  I  can  look  at  a  situation  as 
it  is,  and — " 

"You  are  dreaming — but  yes,  you  are  dream- 
ing still,"  she  interjected.  "And  you  are  a  sports- 
man still,  but  it  is  the  sport  of  a  dreamer,  and  a 
mad  dreamer,  too.  Shiel,  in  spite  of  all  my  faults 
in  the  past,  I  come  to  you,  to  stay  with  you,  to 
live  on  what  you  earn  if  you  like,  if  it's  only  a 
loaf  of  bread  a  day.  I — I  don't  care  about  my 
money.  I  don't  care  about  the  luxuries  which 
money  can  buy;  I  can  do  without  them  if  I  have 
you.  Am  I  not  to  stay,  and  won't  you — won't 
you  kiss  me,  Shiel?" 

She  came  close  to  him — came  round  the  table 
till  she  stood  within  a  few  feet  of  him. 

There  was  one  trembling  instant  when  he 
would  have  taken  her  hungrily  into  his  arms,  but 
as  if  some  evil  spirit  interposed  with  malign 
purpose,  there  came  the  sound  of  feet  on  the 
gravel  outside,  and  the  figure  of  a  man  darkened 

[261] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

the  doorway.  It  was  Augustus  Burlingame, 
whose  face  as  he  saw  Mona  Crozier  took  on  an 
ironical  smile. 

"Yes — what  do  you  want?"  inquired  Crozier 
quietly. 

"A  few  words  with  Mr.  Crozier  on  business, 
if  he  is  not  too  much  occupied?" 

"What  business?" 

"I  am  acting  for  Messrs.  Bradley,  Willingden, 
Baxter,  and  Simmons." 

The  cloud  darkened  on  Crozier's  face.  His 
lips  tightened,  his  face  hardened.  "I  will  see 
you  in  a  moment — wait  outside,  please,"  he 
added,  as  Burlingame  made  as  though  to  step  in- 
side. "Wait  at  the  gate,"  he  added  quietly,  but 
with  undisguised  antipathy. 

The  moment  of  moments  for  Mona  and  him- 
self had  passed.  All  the  bitterness  of  defeat  was 
on  him  a^ain.  All  the  humiliation  of  undeserved  ' 

o 

failure  to  accomplish  what  had  been  the  dear  de- 
sire of  five  years  bore  down  his  spirit  now.  Sud- 
denly he  had  a  suspicion  that  his  wife  had  re- 
ceived information  of  his  whereabouts  from  this 
very  man,  Burlingame.  Had  not  the  Young 
Doctor  said  that  Burlingame  had  written  to  law- 
yers in  the  old  land  to  get  information  concerning 

[262] 


CREATED      HE      THEM 


him?  Was  it  not  more  than  likely  that  he  had 
given  his  wife  the  knowledge  which  had  brought 
her  here*? 

When  Burlingame  had  disappeared  he  turned 
to  Mona.  "Who  told  you  I  was  here?  Who 
wrote  to  you*?"  he  asked  darkly.  The  light  had 
died  away  from  his  face.  It  was  ascetic  in  its 
lonely  gravity  now. 

"Your  doctor  cabled  to  Castlegarry  and  Miss 
Tynan  wrote  to  me." 

A  faint  flush  spread  over  Crozier's  face. 
"How  did  Miss  Tynan  know  where  to  write?" 

Mona  had  told  the  truth  at  once  because  she 
felt  it  was  the  only  way.  Now,  however,  she 
was  in  a  position  where  she  must  either  tell  him 
that  Kitty  had  opened  that  still  sealed  letter  from 
herself  to  him  which  he  had  carried  all  these 
years;  or  else  tell  him  an  untruth.  She  had  no 
right  to  tell  him  what  Kitty  had  told  her.  There 
was  no  other  way  save  to  lie. 

"How  should  I  know?  It  was  enough  for  me 
to  get  her  letter,"  she  replied. 

"At  Castlegarry?" 

What  was  there  to  do?  She  must  keep  faith 
with  Kitty,  who  had  given  her  this  sight  of  her 
husband  again. 

[  263] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"Forwarded  from  Lammis,"  she  said.  "It 
reached  me  before  the  doctor's  cable." 

So  it  was  Kitty — Kitty  Tynan — who  had 
brought  his  wife  to  this  new  home  from  which 
he  had  been  trying  so  hard  to  get  back  to  the  old 
home.  Kitty,  the  angel  of  the  house! 

"You  wrote  me  a  letter  which  drove  me  from 
home,"  he  said  heavily. 

"No — no — no,"  she  protested.  "It  was  not 
that.  I  know  it  was  not  that.  It  was  my  money 
— it  was  that  which  drove  you  away.  You  have 
just  said  so." 

"You  wrote  me  a  hateful  letter,"  he  persisted. 
"You  didn't  want  to  see  me.  You  sent  it  to  me 
by  your  kind,  sweet  young  brother!" 

Her  eyes  flashed.  "My  letter  did  not  drive 
you  away.  It  couldn't  have.  You  went  because 
you  did  not  love  me — that  and  my  money — not 
the  letter,  not  the  letter." 

Somehow  she  had  a  curious  feeling  that  the 
very  letter  which  contained  her  bitter  and  hateful 
reproaches  might  save  her  yet.  The  fact  that  he 
had  not  opened  it — well,  she  must  see  Kitty 
again.  Her  husband  was  in  a  dark  mood.  She 
must  wait.  She  knew  that  her  fortunate  moment 
[264] 


CREATED      HE      THEM 


had  passed  when  the  rogue  Burlingame  appeared. 
She  must  wait  for  another. 

"Shall  I  go  now?  You  want  to  see  that  man 
outside.  Shall  I  go,  Shiel*?"  She  was  very  pale, 
very  quiet,  steady,  and  gentle. 

"I  must  hear  what  that  fellow  has  to  say.  It 
is  business — important,"  he  replied.  "It  may 
mean — anything — everything,  or  nothing." 

As  she  left  the  room  he  had  an  impulse  to  call 
her  back,  but  he  conquered  it. 


[265] 


FOR  a  moment  Crozier  stood  looking  at  the 
closed  doorway  through  which  Mona  had 
gone,  with  a  look  of  repentant  affection  in  his 
eyes;  but  as  the  thought  of  his  own  helpless  in- 
solvency and  broken  hopes  flashed  across  his  mind, 
a  look  of  dark  and  harassed  reflection  shadowed 
his  face.  He  turned  to  the  front  doorway  with 
a  savage  gesture.  The  mutilated  dignity  of  his 
manhood,  the  broken  pride  of  a  lifetime,  the  bit- 
terness in  his  heart  need  not  be  held  in  check  in 
dealing  with  the  man  who  waited  to  give  him  a 
last  thrust  of  enmity. 

He  left  the  house.  Burlingame  was  seated  on 
the  stump  of  a  tree  which  had  been  made  into 
a  seat. 

[266] 


MIDNIGHT      IS      NOT      FAR     OFF 

"Come  to  my  room  if  you  have  business  with 
me,"  Crozier  said  sharply. 

As  they  went,  Crozier  swung  aside  from  the 
front  door  towards  the  comer  of  the  house. 

"The  back  way*?"  asked  Burlingame  with  a 
sneer. 

"You  ought  to  feel  that  familiar,"  was  the 
smarting  reply.  "In  any  case,  you  are  not  wel- 
come in  Mrs.  Tynan's  part  of  the  house.  My 
room  is  my  own,  and  I  should  prefer  you  within 
four  walls  while  we  do  our  business." 

Burlingame's  face  changed  colour  slightly,  for 
the  tone  of  Crozier's  voice,  the  grimness  of  his 
manner,  suggested  an  abnormal  condition.  Bur- 
lingame was  not  a  brave  man  physically.  He 
had  never  lived  the  outdoor  life,  though  he  had 
lived  so  much  among  outdoor  people.  He  was 
that  rare  thing  in  a  new  land,  a  decadent,  a 
connoisseur  in  vice,  a  lover  of  opiates  and 
of  liquor.  He  was  young  enough  yet  not  to 
be  incapacitated  by  it.  His  face  and  hands 
were  white  and  a  little  flabby,  and  he  wore  his 
hair  rather  long,  which,  it  is  said,  accounts  for 
much  weakness  in  some  men,  on  the  assumption 
that  long  hair  wastes  the  strength!  But  Bur- 
lingame quickly  remembered  the  attitude  of  the 
[267] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

lady — Crozier's  wife,  he  was  certain — and  her 
husband  in  the  dining-room  a  few  moments  be- 
fore, and  to  his  suspicious  eyes  it  was  not  char- 
acteristic of  a  happy  family  party.  No  doubt 
this  grimness  of  Crozier  was  due  to  domestic 
trouble  and  not  wholly  to  his  own  presence. 
Still,  he  felt  softly  for  the  tiny  pistol  he  always 
carried  in  his  big  waistcoat-pocket,  and  it  com- 
forted him. 

Beyond  the  corner  of  the  house  Crozier  paused 
and  took  a  key  from  his  pocket.  It  opened  a 
side-door  to  his  own  room,  seldom  used,  since  it 
was  always  so  pleasant  in  this  happy  home  to  go 
through  the  main  living-room,  which  every  one 
liked  so  much  that,  though  it  was  not  the  dining- 
room,  it  was  constantly  used  as  such,  and  though 
is  was  not  the  parlour,  it  was  its  constant  sub- 
stitute. Opening  the  door  Crozier  stepped  aside 
to  let  Burlingame  pass.  It  was  over  two  years 
since  Burlingame  had  been  in  this  room,  and 
then  it  had  been  without  invitation.  His  in- 
quisitiveness  had  led  him  to  enter  it  in  the  old 
days  when  he  lived  in  the  house — before  he  was 
ejected  from  it. 

Entering  now,  he  gave  it  quick  scrutiny.  It 
was  clear  that  he  was  looking  for  something  in 

[268  ] 


MIDNIGHT      IS      NOT      FAR      OFF 

particular.  He  was,  in  fact,  looking  for  signs  of 
its  occupancy  by  another  than  Shiel  Crozier — 
tokens  of  a  woman's  presence.  There  was,  how- 
ever, no  sign  at  all  of  a  woman's  presence,  though 
there  were  signs  of  a  woman's  care  and  attention 
in  a  number  of  little  things — homelike,  solici- 
tous, perhaps  affectionate  care  and  attention. 
Certainly  the  spotless  pillows,  the  pretty  curtains, 
the  pincushion,  and  charmingly  valanced  bed  and 
shelves,  cheap  though  the  material  was,  showed 
a  woman's  very  friendly  care.  When  he  lived 
in  that  house  there  were  no  such  little  attentions 
paid  to  him!  It  was  his  experience  that  where 
such  attentions  went  other  things  accompanied 
them.  A  sensualist  himself,  it  was  not  conceiv- 
able to  him  that  men  and  women  could  be  under 
the  same  roof  without  "passages  of  sympathetic 
friendship  and  tokens  of  affinity" — that  was  a 
phrase  which  he  had  often  used  when  pursuing 
his  own  sort  of  happiness. 

His  swift  scrutiny  of  the  room  showed  that 
Crozier's  wife  had  no  habitation  here,  and  that 
gave  him  his  cue  for  what  the  French  call  "the 
reconstruction  of  the  crime."  It  certainly  was 
clear  that,  as  he  had  suggested  at  the  Logan 
Trial,  there  was  serious  trouble  in  the  Crozier 

[269] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

family  of  two,  and  the  offender  must  naturally 
be  the  man  who  had  flown,  not  the  woman  who 
had  stayed.  Here  was  the  logic  of  facts. 

His  suggestive  glance,  the  look  in  his  face,  did 
not  escape  the  eye  of  Crozier,  who  read  it  all 
aright;  and  a  primitive  expression  of  natural  an- 
tipathy passed  across  his  mediaeval  face,  making 
it  almost  inquisitorial  in  its  dominant  effect. 

"Will  you  wish  to  sit*?"  he  said,  however,  with 
the  courtesy  he  could  never  avoid ;  and  he  pointed 
to  a  chair  beside  the  little  table  in  the  centre  of 
the  room. 

As  Burlingame  sat  down  he  noticed  on  the 
table  a  crumpled  handkerchief.  It  had  lettering 
in  the  corner.  He  spread  it  out  slightly  with 
his  fingers,  as  though  abstractedly  thinking  of 
what  he  was  about  to  say.  The  initial  in  the 
corner  was  K.  Kitty  had  left  it  on  the  table 
while  she  was  talking  to  Mrs.  Crozier  a  half-hour 
before.  No  matter  what  Burlingame  actually 
thought  or  believed,  he  could  not  now  resist  pick- 
ing up  the  handkerchief  and  looking  at  it  with 
a  mocking  smile.  It  was  too  good  a  chance  to 
miss.  He  still  hugged  to  his  evil  heart  the  hu- 
miliating remembrance  of  his  expulsion  from  this 
house,  the  share  which  Crozier  had  had  in  it, 
[270] 


MIDNIGHT      IS      NOT      FAR      OFF 

and  the  things  which  Crozier  had  said  to  him 
then.  He  had  his  Crozier  now  between  the  upper 
and  the  nether  mill-stones,  and  he  meant  to  grind 
him  to  the  flour  of  utter  abasement.  It  was  clear 
that  the  arrival  of  Mrs.  Crozier  had  brought  him 
no  relief,  for  Crozier' s  face  was  not  that  of  a 
man  who  had  found  and  opened  a  casket  of  good 
fortune. 

"Rather  dangerous  that,  in  the  bedroom  of  a 
family  man!"  he  said,  picking  up  the  handker- 
chief and  looking  suggestively  from  the  letter- 
ing in  th°  corner  to  Crozier.  He  laid  it  down 
again,  smiling  detestably. 

Crozier  calmly  picked  up  the  handkerchief,  saw 
the  lettering,  then  went  quietly  to  the  door  of  the 
room  and  called  Mrs.  Tynan's  name  once  or 
twice.  Presently  she  appeared.  Crozier  beck- 
oned her  into  the  room.  When  she  entered  he 
closed  the  door  behind  her. 

"Mrs.  Tynan,"  he  said,  "this  fellow  found 
your  daughter's  handkerchief  on  my  table,  and  he 
has  said  regarding  it,  'Rather  dangerous  that,  in 
the  bedroom  of  a  family  man.'  What  would 
you  like  me  to  do  with  him^" 

Mrs.  Tynan  walked  up  to  Burlingame  with  the 
look  of  a  woman  of  the  Commune  and  said:  "If 
[271] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

I  had  a  son  I  would  disown  him  if  he  didn't 
mangle  you  till  your  wife  would  never  know  you 
again,  you  loathsome  thing.  There  isn't  a  man 
or  woman  in  Askatoon  who  would  believe  your 
sickening  slanders,  for  every  one  knows  what  you 
are.  How  dare  you  enter  this  house"?  If  the 
men  of  Askatoon  had  any  manhood  in  them  they 
would  tar-and-feather  you.  My  girl  is  as  good 
as  any  girl  that  ever  lived,  and  you  know  it. 
Now  go  out  of  here — now !" 

Crozier  intervened  quietly.  "Mrs.  Tynan,  I 
asked  him  in  here  because  it  is  my  room.  I  have 
some  business  with  him.  When  it  is  over,  then 
he  shall  go,  and  we  will  fumigate  the  place.  Re- 
garding the  tar-and- feathers,  you  might  leave  that 
to  me.  I  think  I  can  arrange  it." 

"I'll  turn  the  hose  on  him  as  he  goes  out,  if 
you  don't  mind,"  the  irate  mother  exclaimed  as 
she  left  the  room. 

Crozier  nodded.  "Well,  that  would  be  ap- 
propriate, Mrs.  Tynan,  but  it  wouldn't  cleanse 
him.  He  is  the  original  leopard  whose  spots  are 
there  forever." 

By  this  time  Burlingame  was  on  his  feet,  and 
a  look  of  craft  and  fear  and  ugly  meaning  was 
in  his  face.  Morally  he  was  a  coward,  physically 
[272] 


MIDNIGHT      IS      NOT      FAR      OFF 

he  was  a  coward,  but  he  had  in  his  pocket  a 
weapon  which  gave  him  a  feeling  of  superiority 
in  the  situation ;  and  after  a  night  of  extreme  self- 
indulgence  he  was  in  a  state  of  irritation  of  the 
nerves  which  gave  him  what  the  searchers  after 
excuses  for  ungoverned  instincts  and  acts  call 
"brain-storms."  He  had  always  had  sense 
enough  to  know  that  his  amorous  escapades 
would  get  him  into  trouble  one  day,  and  he  had 
always  carried  the  little  pistol  which  was  now 
so  convenient  to  his  hand.  It  gave  him  a  fic- 
titious courage  which  he  would  not  have  had  un- 
armed against  almost  any  man — or  woman — in 
Askatoon. 

"You  get  a  woman  to  do  your  fighting  for 
you,"  he  said  hatefully.  "You  have  to  drag  her 
in.  It  was  you  I  meant  to  challenge,  not  the  poor 
girl  young  enough  to  be  your  daughter."  His 
hand  went  to  his  waistcoat  pocket.  Crozier  saw 
and  understood. 

Suddenly  Crozier's  eyes  blazed.  The  abnor- 
mal in  him — the  Celtic  strain  always  at  variance 
with  the  normal,  an  almost  ultra-natural  attend- 
ant of  it — awoke  like  a  storm  in  the  tropics.  His 
face  became  transformed,  alive  with  a  passion 
uncanny  in  its  recklessness  and  purpose.  It  was 
[273] 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

a  brain-storm  indeed,  but  it  had  behind  it  a  nor- 
mal power,  a  moral  force  which  was  not  to  be  re- 
sisted. 

"None  of  your  sickly  melodrama  here.  Take 
out  of  your  pocket  the  pistol  you  carry  and  give 
it  to  me,"  Crozier  growled.  "You  are  not  to  be 
trusted.  The  habit  of  thinking  you  would  shoot 
somebody  sometime — somebody  you  had  in- 
jured— might  become  too  much  for  you  to-day, 
and  then  I  should  have  to  kill  you,  and  for  your 
wife's  sake  I  don't  want  to  do  that.  I  always 
feel  sorry  for  a  woman  with  a  husband  like  you. 
You  could  never  shoot  me.  You  couldn't  be 
quick  enough,  but  you  might  try.  Then  I  should 
end  you,  and  there'd  be  another  trial;  but  the 
lawyer  who  defended  me  would  not  have  to  cross- 
examine  any  witness  about  your  character.  It  is 
too  well  known,  Burlingame.  Out  with  it — the 
pistol !"  he  added,  standing  menacingly  over  the 
cowardly  lawyer. 

In  a  kind  of  stupor  under  the  storm  that  was 
breaking  above  him  Burlingame  slowly  drew  out 
of  a  capacious  waistcoat-pocket  his  tiny  but  pow- 
erful pistol  of  the  most  modern  make. 

"Put  it  in  my  hand,"  insisted  Crozier,  his  eyes 
on  the  other's. 

[274] 


MIDNIGHT      IS      NOT      FAR     OFF 

The  flabby  hand  laid  the  weapon  in  Crozier's 
lean  and  strenuous  fingers.  Crozier  calmly  with- 
drew the  cartridges  and  then  tossed  the  weapon 
back  on  the  table. 

"Now  we  have  equality  of  opportunity,"  he 
remarked  quietly.  "If  you  think  you  would  like 
to  repeat  any  slander  you  have  uttered,  do  it 
now;  and  in  a  moment  or  two  Mrs.  Tynan  can 
turn  the  hose  on  the  floor  of  this  room." 

"I  want  to  get  to  business,"  said  Burlingame 
sullenly,  as  he  took  from  his  pocket  a  paper. 

Crozier  nodded.  "I  can  imagine  your  haste," 
he  remarked.  "You  need  all  the  fees  you  can 
get  to  pay  Belle  Bingley's  bills." 

Burlingame  did  not  wince.  He  made  no  re- 
ply to  the  challenge  that  he  was  the  chief  sup- 
porter of  a  certain  wanton  thereabouts. 

"The  time  for  your  option  to  take  ten  thou- 
sand dollars'  worth  of  shares  in  the  syndicate 
is  up,"  he  said;  "and  I  am  instructed  to  inform 
you  that  Messrs.  Bradley,  Willingden,  Baxter  & 
Simmons  propose  to  take  over  your  unpaid  shares 
and  to  complete  the  transaction  without  you." 

"Who    informed    Messrs.    Bradley,    Willing- 
den,  Baxter  &  Simmons  that  I  am  not  prepared 
to  pay  for  my  shares'?"  asked  Crozier  sharply. 
[275] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

"The  time  is  up,"  surlily  replied  Burlingame. 
"It  is  assumed  you  can't  take  up  your  shares,  and 
that  you  don't  want  to  do  so.  The  time  is  up," 
he  added  emphatically,  and  he  tapped  the  paper 
spread  before  him  on  the  table. 

Crozier's  eyes  half  closed  in  an  access  of  stub- 
bornness and  hatred.  "You  are  not  to  assume 
anything  whatever,"  he  declared.  "You  are  to 
accommodate  yourself  to  actual  facts.  The  time 
is  not  up.  It  is  not  up  till  midnight,  and  any 
action  taken  to-day  on  any  other  assumption  will 
give  grounds  for  damages." 

Crozier  spoke  without  passion  and  with  a  cold- 
blooded insistence  not  lost  on  Burlingame.  Tak- 
ing down  a  calendar  from  the  wall,  he  laid  it  be- 
side the  paper  on  the  table  before  the  too  eager 
lawyer.  "Examine  the  dates,"  he  said.  "At 
twelve  o'clock  to-night  Messrs.  Bradley,  Willing- 
den,  Baxter  &  Simmons  are  free  to  act,  if  the 
money  is  not  at  the  disposal  of  the  syndicate  by 
then;  but  till  then  my  option  is  indefeasible. 
Does  that  meet  the  case  or  not*?" 

"It  meets   the   case,"   said   Burlingame   in   a 

morose  voice,  rising.     "If  you  can  produce  the 

money  before  the  stroke  of  midnight,  why  can't 

you  produce  it  now4?     What's  the  use  of  bluff- 

[276] 


MIDNIGHT      IS      NOT      FAR      OFF 

ing!     It   can   do   no   good   in   the   end.     Your 
credit — " 

"My  credit  has  been  stopped  by  your  friends," 
interrupted  Crozier,  "but  my  resources  are  not." 

"Midnight  is  not  far  off,"  viciously  remarked 
Burlingame  as  he  made  for  the  door. 

Crozier  intercepted  him.  "One  word  with  you 
on  a  more  difficult  business  before  you  go,"  he 
said.  "The  tar-and-feathers  for  which  Mrs. 
Tynan  asks  will  be  yours  at  any  moment  I  raise 
my  hand  in  Askatoon.  There  are  enough 
women  alone  who  would  do  it." 

"Talk  of  that  after  midnight,"  sneered  Bur- 
lingame desperately  as  the  door  was  opened  for 
him  by  Crozier. 

"You  had  better  not  go  out  by  the  front  gate," 
remarked  Crozier  scornfully.  "Mrs.  Tynan  is  a 
woman  of  her  word,  and  the  hose  is  handy." 

A  moment  later,  with  contemptuous  satisfac- 
tion, he  saw  Burlingame  climb  the  picket-fence  at 
the  side  of  the  house. 

Turning  back  into  the  room  he  threw  up  his 
arms.  "Midnight — midnight — my  God,  where 
am  I  to  get  the  money !  I  must — I  must  have  it. 
I'll  never,  never  take  it  from  Mona.  I'll  fight  it 
through  alone.  It's  the  only  way  back." 
[277] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

Sitting  down  at  the  table  he  dropped  his  head 
into  his  hands  and  shut  his  eyes  in  utter  dejec- 
tion. 

"Mona — by  Heaven,  no!"  he  said  once,  and 
clenched  his  hands  at  his  temples  and  sat  on  and 
on  unmoving. 


[278] 


CHAPTER  XVII 
WHO  WOULD  HAVE  THOUGHT 


FOR  a  full  half  hour  Crozier  sat  buried  in 
dark  reflection,  then  he  slowly  raised  his 
head,  and  for  a  minute  looked  round  dazedly. 
His  absorption  had  been  so  great  that  for  a  mo- 
ment he  was  like  one  who  had  awakened  upon 
unfamiliar  things.  As  when  in  a  dream  of  the 
night  the  history  of  a  year  will  flash  past  like  a 
ray  of  light,  so  for  the  bad  half  hour  in  which 
Crozier  had  given  himself  up  to  despair,  his  mind 
had  travelled  through  an  incongruous  series  of 
incidents  of  his  past  life,  and  had  also  revealed 
pictures  of  solution  after  solution  of  his  pres- 
ent troubles. 

He  had  that  gift  of  visualisation  which  makes 

life  an  endless  procession  of  pictures  which  allure, 

or  which  wear  the  nature  into  premature  old  age. 

The  last  picture  flashing  before  his  eyes,  as  he 

[279] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

sat  there  alone,  was  of  himself  and  his  elder 
brother,  Garnett,  now  master  of  Castlegarry,  rac- 
ing ponies  to  reach  the  lodge-gates  before  they 
closed  for  the  night,  after  a  day  of  disobedience 
and  truancy.  He  remembered  how  Garnett  had 
given  him  the  better  pony  of  the  two,  so  that  the 
younger  brother,  who  would  be  more  heavily  pun- 
ished if  they  were  locked  out,  should  have  the 
better  chance.  And  Garnett,  if  odd  in  manner 
and  character,  had  always  been  a  true  sportsman 
though  not  a  lover  of  sport. 

If — if — why  had  he  never  thought  of  Garnett  *? 
Garnett  could  help  him  and  he  would  do  so.  He 
would  let  Garnett  stand  in  with  him — take  one- 
third  of  his  profits  from  the  syndicate.  Yes,  he 
must  ask  Garnett  to  see  him  through.  Then  it 
was  that  he  lifted  his  head  from  his  hands,  and 
his  mind  awakened  out  of  a  dream  as  real  as 
though  he  had  actually  been  asleep.  Garnett— 
alas !  Garnett  was  thousands  of  miles  away,  and 
he  had  not  heard  from  him  for  five  years.  Still, 
he  knew  the  master  of  Castlegarry  was  alive,  for 
he  had  seen  him  mentioned  in  a  chance  number  of 
tfhe  Morning  Post  lately  come  to  his  hands. 
What  avail !  Garnett  was  at  Castlegarry,  and 
at  midnight  his  chance  of  fortune  and  a  new  life 
[280] 


WHO      WOULD      HAVE      THOUGHT      I  T    f 

would  be  gone.  Then,  penniless,  he  would  have 
to  face  Mona  again ;  and  what  would  come  of  that 
he  could  not  see,  would  not  try  to  see.  There 
was  an  alternative  he  would  not  attempt  to  face 
until  after  midnight,  when  this  crisis  in  his  life 
would  be  over.  Beyond  midnight  was  a  dark- 
ness which  he  would  not  now  try  to  pierce.  As 
his  eyes  again  became  accommodated  to  his  sur- 
roundings a  look  of  determination,  the  determina- 
tion of  the  true  fatalist,  the  true  gambler,  came 
into  his  face.  The  real  gambler  never  gives  in 
till  all  is  gone;  never  gives  up  till  after  the  last 
throw  of  the  last  penny  of  cash  or  credit;  for  he 
has  seen  such  innumerable  times  the  thing  come 
right  and  good  fortune  extend  a  friendly  hand 
with  the  last  throw  of  all. 

Suddenly  he  remembered — saw — a  scene  in  the 
gambling  rooms  at  Monte  Carlo  on  the  only  visit 
he  had  ever  paid  to  the  place.  He  had  played 
constantly,  and  had  won  each  day  more  or  less. 
Then  his  fortune  turned  and  he  lost  and  lost 
each  day.  At  last,  one  evening,  he  walked  up 
to  a  table  and  said  to  the  croupier,  "When  was 
zero  up  last1?"  The  croupier  answered,  "Not  for 
an  hour."  Forthwith  he  began  to  put  money  on 
zero  and  on  nothing  else.  For  two  hours  he 
[281] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

put  money  at  each  turn  of  the  wheel  on  zero. 
For  two  hours  he  lost.  Increasing  his  stake, 
which  had  begun  at  five  francs  and  had  risen  at 
length  to  five  louis,  he  still  coaxed  the  unre- 
sponsive zero.  Finally  midnight  came,  and  he 
was  the  only  person  playing  at  the  table.  All 
others  had  gone  or  had  ceased  to  play.  These 
stayed  to  watch  the  "mad  Inglesi,"  as  a  foreigner 
called  him,  knocking  his  head  against  the  foot- 
stool of  an  unresponsive  god  of  chance.  The 
croupiers  watched  also  with  somewhat  disdainful, 
somewhat  pitying  interest,  this  last  representative 
of  a  class  who  have  an  insane  notion  that  the  law 
of  chances  is  in  their  favour  if  they  can  stick  it  out 
long  enough.  And  how  often  had  they  seen  the 
stubborn  challenger  of  a  black  demon,  who  would 
not  appear  according  to  the  law  of  chances,  leave 
the  table  ruined  forever. 

Smiling,  Crozier  had  played  on  till  he  had  but 
thirty  louis  left.  Counting  them  over  with  a 
cheerful  exactness,  he  rose  up,  lit  a  cigarette, 
placed  the  thirty  louis  on  zero  with  a  cynical 
precision,  and  with  a  gay  smile  kissed  his  hand 
to  the  refractory  Nothing  and  said,  "You've  got 
it  all  Zero — good-night!  Good-night,  Zero!" 
Then  he  had  buttoned  his  coat  and  turned  away 
[  282  ] 


WHO      WOULD      HAVE      THOUGHT      I  T    f 

to  seek  the  cooler  air  of  the  Mediterranean.  He 
had  gone  but  a  step  or  two,  his  head  half-play- 
fully  turned  to  the  table  where  the  dwindling 
onlookers  stood  watching  the  wheel  spin  round, 
when  suddenly  he  heard  the  croupier  cry,  "Zero!" 

Smilingly  he  came  back  to  the  table  and  picked 
up  the  thousand  and  more  louis  he  had  won — won 
by  his  last  throw  and  with  his  last  available  coin. 

As  the  scene  passed  before  him  now  he  got  to 
his  feet  and,  with  that  look  of  the  visionary  in 
his  eyes,  which  those  only  know  who  have 
watched  the  born  gamester,  said,  "I'll  back  my 
hand  till  the  last  throw." 

Then  it  was,  as  his  eyes  gazed  in  front  of  him 
dreamily,  he  saw  the  card  on  his  mirror  bearing 
the  words,  "Courage,  soldier!" 

With  a  deepening  flame  in  his  eyes  he  went 
over  and  gazed  at  it  long.  At  length  he  reached 
out  and  touched  the  writing  with  a  caressing 
finger. 

"Kitty — Kitty,  how  great  you  are!"  he  said. 
Then  as  he  turned  to  the  outer  door  a  softness 
came  into  his  face,  stole  up  into  his  brilliant  eyes 
and  dimmed  them  with  a  tear.  "What  a  hand 
to  hold  in  the  dark — the  dark  of  life!"  he  said 
aloud.  "Courage,  soldier,"  he  added  as  he 

[283] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

opened  the  door  by  which  he  had  entered,  through 
which  Burlingame  had  gone,  and  strode  away  to- 
wards the  town  of  Askatoon,  feeling  somehow  in 
his  heart  that  before  midnight  his  luck  would 
turn. 

From  the  dining-room  Kitty  had  watched  him 
go.  "Courage,  soldier!"  she  whispered  after 
him,  and  she  laughed;  but  almost  immediately 
she  threw  her  head  up  with  a  gasping  sigh,  and 
when  it  was  lowered  again  two  tears  were  steal- 
ing down  her  cheeks. 

With  an  effort  she  conquered  herself,  wiped 
away  the  tears,  and  said  aloud  with  a  whimsical 
but  none  the  less  pitiful  self-reproach,  "Kitty — 
Kitty  Tynan,  what  a  fool  you  are!" 

Entering  the  room  Crozier  had  left,  she  went 
to  the  desk  with  the  green-baize  top,  opened  it, 
and  took  out  the  fateful  letter  which  Mona  Cro- 
zier had  written  to  her  husband  five  years  ago. 
Putting  it  into  her  pocket  she  returned  to  the 
dining-room.  She  stood  there  for  a  moment  with 
her  chin  in  her  hands  and  deep  reflection  in  her 
eyes,  and  then,  going  to  the  door  of  her  mother's 
sitting-room,  she  opened  it  and  beckoned.  A  mo- 
ment later  Mrs.  Crozier  and  the  Young  Doctor 

[284] 


WHO      WOULD     HAVE      THOUGHT     I  T    f 

entered  the  dining-room  and  sat  down  at  a  mo- 
tion from  her.  Presently  she  said: 

"Mrs.  Crozier,  I  have  here  the  letter  your  hus- 
band received  from  you  five  years  ago  in  Lon- 
don." 

Mrs.  Crozier  flushed.  She  had  been  master- 
ful by  nature,  and  she  had  had  her  way  very 
much  in  life.  To  be  dominated  in  the  most  in- 
timate things  of  her  life  by  this  girl  was  not 
easy  to  be  borne;  but  she  realised  that  Kitty  had 
been  a  friend  indeed,  even  if  not  obviously  con- 
ventional. In  response  to  Kitty's  remark  now 
she  inclined  her  head. 

"Well,  you  have  told  us  that  you  and  your 
husband  haven't  made  it  up.  That  is  so,  isn't 
it?"  Kitty  continued. 

"If  you  wish  to  put  it  that  way,"  answered 
Mona,  stiffening  a  little  in  spite  of  herself. 

"P'r'aps  I  don't  put  it  very  well,  but  it  is  the 
stony  fact,  isn't  it,  Mrs.  Crozier *?" 

Mona  hesitated  a  moment,  then  answered: 
"He  is  very  upset  concerning  the  land  syndicate, 
and  he  has  a  quixotic  idea  that  he  cannot  take 
money  from  me  to  help  him  carry  it  through." 

"I  don't  quite  know  what  quixotic  means,"  re- 
joined Kitty  dryly.  "If  it  wasn't  understood 
[285] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

while  you  lived  together  that  what  was  one's  was 
the  other's,  that  it  was  all  in  one  purse,  and  that 
you  shut  your  eyes  to  the  name  on  the  purse  and 
took  as  you  wanted,  I  don't  see  how  you  could 
expect  him,  after  your  five  years'  desertion,  to  take 
money  from  you  now." 

"My  five  years'  desertion!"  exclaimed  Mona. 
Surely  this  girl  was  more  than  reckless  in  her 
talk. 

Kitty  was  not  to  be  put  down.  "If  you  don't 
mind  plain  speaking,  he  was  always  with  you, 
but  you  weren't  always  with  him  in  those  days. 
This  letter  showed  that."  She  tapped  it  on  her 
thumb-nail.  "It  was  only  when  he  had  gone*  and 
you  saw  what  you  had  lost,  that  you  came  back 
to  him — in  heart,  I  mean.  Well,  if  you  didn't 
go  away  with  him  when  he  went,  and  you 
wouldn't  have  gone  unless  he  had  ordered  you 
to  go — and  he  wouldn't  do  that — it's  clear  you 
deserted  him,  since  you  did  that  which  drove  him 
from  home,  and  you  stayed  there  instead  of  go- 
ing with  him.  I've  worked  it  out,  and  it  is  cer- 
tain you  deserted  him  five  years  ago.  Desertion 
doesn't  mean  a  sea  of  water  between,  it  means  an 
ocean  of  self-will  and  love-me-first  between.  If 
[286] 


WHO   WOULD   HAVE   THOUGHT   IT? 

you  hadn't  deserted  him,  as  this  letter  shows,  he 
wouldn't  have  been  here.  I  expect  he  told  you 
so;  and  if  he  did,  what  did  you  say  to  him*?" 

The  Young  Doctor's  eyes  were  full  of  decorous 
mirth  and  apprehension,  for  such  logic  and  such 
impudence  as  Kitty's  was  like  none  he  had  ever 
heard.  Yet  it  was  commanding,  too. 

Kitty  caught  the  look  in  his  eyes  and  blazed 
up.  "Isn't  what  I  said  correct"?  Isn't  it  all  true 
and  logical*?  And  if  it  is  why  do  you  sit  there 
looking  so  superior?" 

The  Young  Doctor  made  a  gesture  of  mock  and 
deprecating  apology.  "It's  all  true,  and  it's 
logical,  too,  if  you  stand  on  your  head  when  you 
think  it.  But  whether  it  is  logical  or  not,  it  is 
your  conclusion,  and  as  you've  taken  the  thing 
in  hand  to  set  it  right,  it  is  up  to  you  now.  We 
can  only  hold  hard  and  wait." 

With  a  shrug  of  her  graceful  shoulders,  Kitty 
turned  again  to  Mrs.  Crozier,  who  intervened 
hastily,  saying:  "I  did  not  have  a  chance  of  say- 
ing to  him  all  I  wished.  Of  course  he  could  not 
take  my  money,  but  there  was  his  own  money !  I 
was  going  to  tell  him  about  that,  but  just  then 
the  lawyer,  Mr.  Burlingame — " 
[287] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"They  all  call  him  'Gus'  Burlingame.  He 
doesn't  get  the  civility  of  Mr.  here  in  Askatoon," 
interposed  Kitty. 

Mona  made  an  impatient  gesture.  "If  you 
will  listen,  I  want  to  tell  you  about  Mr.  Cro- 
zier's  money.  He  thinks  he  has  no  money,  but 
he  has.  He  has  a  good  deal." 

She  paused,  and  the  Young  Doctor  and  Kitty 
leaned  forward  eagerly.  "Well,  but  go  on,"  said 
Kitty.  "If  he  has  money  he  must  have  it  to- 
day, and  now.  Certainly  he  doesn't  know  of  it. 
He  thinks  he  is  broke, — dead  broke — and  there' d 
be  a  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dollars  for  him 
if  he  could  put  up  ten  thousand  dollars  to-night. 
If  I  were  you  I  wouldn't  hide  it  from  him  any 
longer." 

Mona.  got  to  her  feet  in  anger.  "If  you  would 
give  me  a  chance  to  explain,  I  would  do  so,"  she 
said,  her  lips  trembling.  "Unfortunately,  I  am 
in  your  hands,  but  please  give  me  credit  for  some 
intelligence — and  some  heart.  In  any  case  I 
shall  not  be  bullied." 

The  Young  Doctor  almost  laughed  outright, 
despite  the  danger  of  the  situation.  He  was  not 
prepared  for  Kitty's  reply  and  the  impulsive  act 
that  marched  with  it.  In  an  instant  Kitty  had 

[288] 


WHO   WOULD  HAVE   THOUGHT   IT? 

caught  Mona  Crozier's  hand  and  pressed  it 
warmly.  "I  was  only  doing  what  I've  seen 
lawyers  do,"  she  said  eagerly.  "I've  got  some- 
thing that  I  want  you  to  do,  and  I've  been  trying 
to  work  up  to  it.  That's  all.  I'm  not  as  mean 
and  bad-mannered  as  you  think  me.  I  really  do 
care  what  happens  to  him — to  you  both,"  she 
hastened  to  add. 

Struggling  to  keep  back  her  tears,  and  in  a  low 
voice  Mona  rejoined:  "I  meant  to  have  told 
him  what  I'm  going  to  tell  you  now.  I  couldn't 
say  anything  about  the  money  belonging  to  him 
till  I  had  told  him  how  it  came  to  be  his." 

After  a  moment's  pause  she  continued:  "He 
told  you  all  about  the  race  which  Flamingo  lost, 
and  about  that  letter."  She  pointed  to  the  let- 
ter which  Kitty  still  carried  in  her  hand.  "Well, 
that  letter  was  written  under  the  sting  of  bitter 
disappointment.  I  was  vain.  I  was  young.  I 
did  not  understand  as  I  do  now.  If  you  were 
not  such  good  friends — of  his — I  could  not  tell 
you  this.  It  seemed  to  me  that  by  breaking  his 
pledge  he  showed  he  did  not  care  for  me;  that 
he  thought  he  could  break  a  sacred  pledge  to  me, 
and  it  didn't  matter.  I  thought  it  was  treating 
me  lightly — to  do  it  so  soon  after  the  pledge  was 
[289] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

given.  I  was  irritated,  angry.  I  felt  we  weren't 
as  we  might  be,  and  I  felt,  too,  that  I  must  be  at 
fault;  but  I  was  so  proud  that  I  didn't  want  to 
admit  it,  I  suppose,  when  he  did  give  me  a  griev- 
ance. It  was  all  so  mixed.  I  was  shocked  at  his 
breaking  his  pledge,  I  was  so  vexed  that  our  mar- 
riage hadn't  been  the  success  it  might  have  been; 
and  I  think  I  was  a  little  mad." 

"That  is  not  the  monopoly  of  only  one  of  your 
sex,"  interposed  the  Young  Doctor  dryly.  "If  I 
were  you  I  wouldn't  apologise  for  it.  You 
speak  to  a  sister  in  like  distress." 

Kitty's  eyes  flamed  up,  but  she  turned  her 
head,  as  though  some  licensed  libertine  of  speech 
had  had  his  say,  and  looked  with  friendly  eyes 
at  Mona.  "Yes,  yes — please  go  on,"  she  urged. 

"When  I  wrote  that  letter  I  had  forgotten  what 
I  had  done  the  day  before  the  race.  I  had  gone 
into  my  husband's  room  to  find  some  things  I 
needed  from  the  drawer  of  his  dressing-table ;  and 
far  at  the  back  of  a  drawer  I  found  a  crumpled-up 
roll  of  ten-pound  notes.  It  was  fifty  pounds  al- 
together. I  took  the  notes — " 

She  paused  a  moment  and  the  room  became 
very  still.     Both  her  listeners  were  sure  that  they 
were  approaching  a  thing  of  deep  importance. 
[290] 


WHO      WOULD      HAVE      THOUGHT      I  T    f 

In  a  lower  voice  Mona  continued:  "I  don't 
know  what  possessed  me,  but  perhaps  it  was  that 
the  things  he  did  of  which  I  disapproved  most 
had  got  a  hold  on  me  in  spite  of  myself.  I  said 
to  myself:  'I  am  going  to  the  Derby.  I  will 
take  the  fifty  pounds,  and  I'll  put  it  on  a  horse 
for  Shiel.'  He  had  talked  so  much  to  my  brother 
about  Flamingo  and  I  had  seen  him  go  wrong 
so  often,  that  I  had  a  feeling  if  I  put  it  on  a  horse 
that  Shiel  particularly  condemned,  it  would  prob- 
ably win.  He  had  been  wrong  nearly  every  time 
for  two  years.  It  was  his  money,  and  if  it  won, 
it  would  make  him  happy;  and  if  it  didn't  win, 
well,  he  didn't  know  the  money  existed — I  was 
sure  of  that,  and,  anyhow,  I  could  replace  it.  I 
put  it  on  a  horse  he  condemned  utterly,  but  which 
one  or  two  people  spoke  well  of.  You  know 
what  happened  to  Flamingo.  While  at  Epsom 
I  heard  from  friends  that  Shiel  was  present  at 
the  race,  though  he  had  said  he  would  not  go. 
Later  I  learned  that  he  had  lost  heavily.  Then 
I  saw  him  in  the  distance  paying  out  money  and 
giving  bills  to  the  bookmakers.  It  made  me  very 
angry.  I  don't  think  I  was  quite  sane.  Most 
women  are  like  that  at  times." 

"As  I  said,"  remarked  the  Young  Doctor,  his 

[291] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

face  mirthfully  alive.  Here  was  a  situation  in- 
deed. 

"So  I  wrote  him  that  letter,"  Mona  went  on. 
"I  had  forgotten  all  about  the  money  I  put  on 
the  outsider  which  won  the  race.  As  you  know, 
I  was  called  away  to  my  sick  sister  that  evening, 
and  the  money  I  won  with  Shiel's  fifty  pounds 
was  not  paid  to  me  till  after  Shiel  had  gone." 

"How  much  was  it1?"  asked  Kitty  breathlessly. 

"Four  thousand  pounds." 

Kitty  exclaimed  so  loudly  that  she  smothered 
her  mouth  with  a  hand.  "Why,  he  only  needs 
for  the  syndicate  two  thousand  pounds — ten 
thousand  dollars!"  she  said  excitedly.  "But 
what's  the  good  of  it,  if  he  can't  lay  his  hand  on 
it  by  midnight  to-night!" 

"He  can  do  so,"  was  Mona's  quick  reply.  "I 
was  going  to  tell  him  that,  but  the  lawyer  came, 
and—" 

Kitty  sprang  up  and  down  in  excitement.  "I 
had  a  plan.  It  might  have  worked  without  this. 
It  was  the  only  way  then.  But  this  makes  it 
sure — yes,  most  beautifully  sure.  It  shows  that 
the  thing  to  do  is  to  follow  your  convictions. 
You  say  you  actually  have  the  money,  Mrs.  Cro- 
zier?' 

[292  ] 


WHO      WOULD      HAVE      THOUGHT      I  T    f 

Mona  took  from  her  pocket  an  envelope,  and 
out  of  it  she  drew  four  Bank  of  England  notes. 
"Here  it  is — here  are  four  one-thousand-pound 
notes.  I  had  it  paid  to  me  that  way  five  years 
ago,  and  here — here  it  is !"  she  added  with  almost 
a  touch  of  hysteria  in  her  voice,  for  the  excite- 
ment of  it  all  acted  on  her  like  an  electric 
storm. 

"Well,  we'll  get  to  work  at  once,"  declared 
Kitty,  looking  at  the  notes  admiringly,  then  tak- 
ing them  from  Mona  and  smoothing  them  out 
with  tender  firmness.  "It's  just  the  luck  of  the 
wide  world,  as  my  father  used  to  say.  It  actually 
is.  Now  you  see,"  she  continued,  "it's  like 
this.  That  letter  you  wrote  him" — she  ad- 
dressed herself  to  Mona — "it  has  to  be  changed. 
You  have  got  to  rewrite  it,  and  you  must  put  into 
it  these  four  bank-notes.  Then  when  you  see 
him  again  you  must  have  that  letter  opened  at 
exactly  the  right  moment,  and — oh,  I  wonder  if 
you  will  do  it  exactly  right!"  she  added  dubi- 
ously to  Mona.  "You  don't  play  your  cards 
very  well,  and  it's  just  possible  that,  even  now, 
with  all  the  cards  in  your  hands,  you  will  throw 
them  away  as  you  did  in  the  past.  I  wish 
that—" 

[293] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

Seeing  Mona's  agitation  changing  to  choler, 
the  Young  Doctor  intervened  quickly.  He  did 
not  know  Kitty  was  purposely  stinging  Crozier's 
unhappy  little  consort,  so  that  she  should  be  put 
upon  her  mettle  to  do  the  thing  without  bungling. 

"You  can  trust  Mrs.  Crozier  to  use  discretion 
and  act  carefully;  but  what  exactly  do  you 
mean*?  I  judge  that  Mrs.  Crozier  does  not  see 
more  distinctly  than  I  do,"  he  remarked  inquir- 
ingly to  Kitty,  and  with  admonishment  in  tone 
and  emphasis. 

"No,  I  do  not  understand  quite — will  you  ex- 
plain*?" interposed  Mona  with  inner  resentment 
at  being  managed,  but  feeling  that  she  could  not 
do  without  Kitty  even  if  she  would. 

"As  I  said,"  continued  Kitty,  "I  will  open  that 
letter,  and  you  will  put  in  another  letter  and 
these  bank-notes;  and  when  he  repeats  what  he 
said  about  the  way  you  felt  and  wrote  when  he 
broke  his  pledge,  you  can  blaze  up  and  tell  him 
to  open  the  letter.  Then  he  will  be  so  sorry  that 
he'll  get  down  on  his  knees,  and  you  will  be  happy 
ever  after." 

"But  it  will  be  a  fraud,  and  dishonest  and  dis- 
honourable," protested  Mona. 

Kitty  almost  sniffed,  but  she  was  too  agitated 

[294] 


WHO   WOULD   HAVE   THOUGHT   IT? 

to  be  scornful.  "Just  leave  that  to  me,  please. 
It  won't  make  me  a  bit  more  dishonourable  to 
open  the  letter  again — I've  opened  it  once,  and  I 
don't  feel  any  the  worse  for  it.  I  have  no  con- 
science, and  things  don't  weigh  on  my  mind  at 
all.  I'm  a  light-minded  person." 

Looking  closely  at  her  the  Young  Doctor  got 
a  still  further  insight  into  the  mind  and  soul  of 
this  prairie  girl,  who  used  a  lid  of  irony  to  cover 
a  well  of  deep  feeling.  Things  did  not  weigh 
on  her  mind !  He  was  sure  that  pain  to  the  wife 
of  Shiel  Crozier  would  be  mortal  torture  to  Kitty 
Tynan. 

"But  I  felt  exactly  what  I  wrote  that  Derby 
Day  when  he  broke  his  pledge,  and  he  ought  to 
know  me  exactly  as  I  was,"  urged  Mona.  "I 
don't  want  to  deceive  him,  to  appear  a  bit  bet- 
ter than  I  am." 

"Oh,  you'd  rather  lose  him!"  said  Kitty  almost 
savagely.  "Knowing  how  hard  it  is  to  keep  a 
man  under  the  best  circumstances,  you'd  will- 
ingly make  the  circumstances  as  bad  as  they  can 
be — is  that  it"?  Besides,  weren't  you  sorry  after- 
wards that  you  wrote  that  letter*?" 

"Yes,  yes,  desperately  sorry." 

"And  you  wished  often  that  your  real  self  had 
[295] 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

written  on  Derby  Day  and  not  the  scratch-cat 
you  were  then?" 

Mona  flushed,  but  answered  bravely,  "Yes,  a 
thousand  times." 

"What  business  had  you  to  show  him  your  cat- 
self,  your  unreal,  not  your  real  self  on  Derby 
Day  five  years  ago?  Wasn't  it  your  duty  to 
show  him  your  real  self?" 

Mona  nodded  helplessly.  "Yes,  I  know  it 
was." 

"Then  isn't  it  your  duty  to  see  that  your  real 
self  speaks  in  that  letter  now?" 

"I  want  him  to  know  me  exactly  as  I  am,  and 
then—" 

Kitty  made  a  passionate  gesture.  Was  ever 
such  an  uncomprehending  woman  as  this  diamond- 
button  of  a  wife? 

"And  then  you  would  be  unhappy  ever  after 
instead  of  being  happy  ever  after.  What  is  the 
good  of  prejudicing  your  husband  against  you  by 
telling  the  unnecessary  truth.  He  is  in  a  desper- 
ate mood,  and  besides,  he  has  been  away  from  you 
for  five  years,  and  we  all  change  somehow — par- 
ticularly men,  when  there  are  so  many  women  in 
the  world,  and  very  pretty  women  of  all  ages 
and  kinds  and  colours  and  tastes,  and  dazzling 
[296] 


WHO   WOULD   HAVE   THOUGHT  IT? 

deceitful  hussies  too.  It  isn't  wise  for  any 
woman  to  let  her  husband  or  any  one  at  all 
see  her  exactly  as  she  is;  and  only  the  silly  ones 
do  it.  They  tell  what  they  think  is  the  truth 
about  their  own  wickedness,  and  it  isn't  the  truth 
at  all,  because  I  suppose  women  don't  know  how 
to  tell  the  exact  truth;  and  they  can  be  just  as  un- 
fair to  themselves  as  they  are  to  others.  Be- 
sides, haven't  you  any  sense  of  humour,  Mrs. 
Crozier?  It's  as  good  as  a  play,  this.  Just 
think,  after  five  years  of  desertion,  and  trouble 
without  end,  and  it  all  put  right  by  a  little  sleight- 
of-hand.  Shall  I  open  it?" 

She  held  the  letter  up.  Mona  nodded  almost 
eagerly  now,  for  come  of  a  subtle,  social  world 
far  away,  she  still  was  no  match  for  the  subtlety 
of  the  wilds — or  was  it  the  cunning  that  the  wild 
things  know? 

Kitty  left  the  room,  but  in  a  moment  afterward 
returned  with  the  letter  open.  "The  kettle  on 
the  hob  is  the  friend  of  the  family,"  she  said 
gaily.  "Here  it  is  all  ready  for  what  there  is  to 
do.  You  go  and  keep  watch  for  Mr.  Crozier," 
she  added  to  the  Young  Doctor.  "He  won't  be 
gone  long,  I  should  think,  and  we  don't  want  him 
bursting  in  on  us  before  I've  got  that  letter  safe 
[297] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

back  into  his  desk.  If  he  comes,  you  keep  him 
busy  for  a  moment.  When  we're  quite  ready  I'll 
come  to  the  front  door,  and  then  you  will  know  it 
is  all  right." 

"I'm  to  go  while  you  make  up  your  prescrip- 
tion— all  right!"  said  the  Young  Doctor,  and 
with  a  wave  of  the  hand  he  left  the  room. 

Instantly  Kitty  brought  a  lead  pencil  and  pa- 
per. "Now  sit  down  and  write  to  him,  Mrs. 
Crozier,"  she  said  briskly.  "Use  discretion; 
don't  gush;  slap  his  face  a  little  for  breaking  his 
pledge,  and  afterwards  tell  him  that  you  did  at 
the  Derby  what  you  had  abused  him  for  doing. 
Then  tell  him  about  this  four  thousand  pounds- 
twenty  thousand  dollars — my,  what  a  lot  of 
money,  and  all  got  in  one  day !  Tell  him  that  it 
was  all  won  by  his  own  cash.  It's  as  easy  as  can 
be,  and  it  will  be  a  certainty  now." 

So  saying  she  lit  a  match.  "You  hold  this 
wicked  old  catfish  letter  into  the  flame,  please, 
Mrs.  Crozier,  and  keep  praying  all  the  time,  and 
please  remember  that  'our  little  hands  were  never 
made  to  tear  each  other's  eyes.' ' 

Mona's   small   fingers   were   trembling  as  she 
held  the  fateful  letter  into  the  flame,  and  then  in 
[298] 


WHO   WOULD   HAVE  THOUGHT  IT? 

silence  both  watched  it  burn  to  a  cinder.  A 
faint,  hopeful  smile  was  on  Mona's  face  now. 

"What  isn't  never  was  to  those  that  never 
knew/'  said  Kitty  briskly,  and  pushed  a  chair  up 
to  the  table.  "Now  sit  down  and  write,  please." 

Mona  sat  down.  Taking  up  a  sheet  of  note- 
paper  she  looked  at  it  dubiously. 

"Oh,  what  a  fool  I  am!"  said  Kitty,  under- 
standing the  look.  "And  that's  what  every 
criminal  does — he  forgets  something.  I  forgot 
the  note-paper.  Of  course  you  can't  use  that 
note-paper.  Of  course  not.  He'd  know  it  in  a 
minute.  Besides,  the  sheet  we  burned  had  an  en- 
graved address  on  it.  I  never  thought  of  that — 
good  gracious !" 

"Wait — wait,"  said  Mona,  her  face  lighting. 
"I  may  have  some  sheets  in  my  writing-case. 
It's  only  a  chance,  but  there  were  some  torn  sheets 
in  it  when  I  left  home.  I'll  go  and  see." 

While  she  was  gone  to  her  bedroom  Kitty  stood 
still  in  the  middle  of  the  room  lost  in  reflection, 
as  completely  absorbed  as  though  she  was  see- 
ing things  thousands  of  miles  away.  In  truth, 
she  was  seeing  things  millions  of  miles  away;  she 
was  seeing  a  Promised  Land.  It  was  a  gift  of 
[299] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

hers,  or  a  penalty  of  her  life,  perhaps,  that  she 
could  lose  herself  in  reverie  at  a  moment's  no- 
tice— a  reverie  as  complete  as  though  she  was 
subtracted  from  life's  realities.  Now,  as  she 
looked  out  of  the  door,  far  over  the  prairie  to  a 
tiny  group  of  pine-trees  in  the  vanishing  distance, 
lines  she  once  read  floated  through  her  mind: 

"Away  and  beyond  the  point  of  pines, 

In  a  pleasant  land  where  the  glad  grapes  be, 

Purple  and  pendant  on  verdant  vines, 
I  know  that  my  fate  is  awaiting  me." 

What  fate  was  to  be  hers?  There  was  no  joy 
in  her  eyes  as  she  gazed.  Mrs.  Crozier  was  be- 
side the  table  again  before  she  roused  herself  from 
her  trance. 

"I've  got  it — just  two  sheets,  two  solitary 
sheets,"  said  Mona  in  triumph.  "How  long  they 
have  been  in  my  case  I  don't  know.  It  is  almost 
uncanny  they  should  be  there  just  when  they're 
most  needed." 

"Providential,  we  should  say  out  here,"  was 
Kitty's  response.  "Begin,  please.  Be  sure  you 
have  the  right  date.  It  was — " 

Mona  had  already  written  the  date,  and  she 
interrupted  Kitty  with  the  words,  "As  though  I 

[300] 


WHO   WOULD   HAVE   THOUGHT  IT? 

could  forget  it!"  All  at  once  Kitty  put  a  re- 
straining hand  on  her  arm. 

"Wait — wait,  you  mustn't  write  on  that  paper 
yet.  Suppose  you  didn't  say  the  real  wise 
thing — and  only  two  sheets  of  paper  and  so  much 
to  say?" 

"How  right  you  always  are!"  said  Mona,  and 
took  up  one  of  the  blank  sheets  which  Kitty  had 
just  brought  her. 

Then  she  began  to  write.  For  a  minute  she 
wrote  swiftly,  nervously,  and  had  nearly  fin- 
ished a  page  when  Kitty  said  to  her,  "I  think 
I  had  better  see  what  you  have  written.  I 
don't  think  you  are  the  best  judge.  You  see,  I 
have  known  him  better  than  you  for  the  last  five 
years,  and  I  am  the  best  judge — please,  I  mean  it 
in  the  Tightest,  kindest  way,"  she  added,  as  she 
saw  Mona  shrink.  It  was  like  hurting  a  child, 
and  she  loved  children — so  much.  She  had  al- 
ways a  vision  of  children  at  her  knee. 

Silently  Mrs.  Crozier  pushed  the  sheets  towards 
her.  Kitty  read  the  page  with  a  strange,  eager 
look  in  her  eyes.  "Yes,  that's  right  as  far  as  it 
goes,"  she  said.  "It  doesn't  gush.  It's  natural. 
It's  you  as  you  are  now,  not  as  you  were  then, 
of  course." 

[301] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

Again  Mona  bent  over  the  paper  and  wrote  till 
she  had  completed  a  page.  Then  Kitty  looked 
over  her  shoulder  and  read  what  had  been  written. 
"No,  no,  no,  that  won't  do,"  she  exclaimed. 
"That  won't  do  at  all.  It  isn't  in  the  way  that 
will  do  what  we  want  done.  You've  gone  quite, 
quite  wrong.  I'll  do  it.  I'll  dictate  it  to  you. 
I  know  exactly  what  to  say,  and  we  mustn't  make 
any  mistake.  Write,  please — you  must." 

Mona  scratched  out  what  had  been  written 
without  a  word.  "I  am  waiting,"  she  said  sub- 
missively. 

"All  right.  Now  we  go  on.  Write.  I'll 
dictate." 

"  'And  look  here,  dearest,'  "  she  began,  but 
Mona  stopped  her. 

"We  do  not  say  'look  here'  in  England.  I 
would  have  said  'and  see.'  " 

"And  see — dearest,"  corrected  Kitty,  with  an 
accent  on  the  last  word,  "while  I  was  mad  at  you 
for  the  moment  for  breaking  your  promise — " 

"In  England  we  don't  say  'mad'  in  that  con- 
nection," Mona  again  interrupted.  "We  say 
'angry'  or  'annoyed'  or  'vexed.' '  There  was 
real  distress  in  her  tone. 

"Now  I'll  tell  you  what  to  do,"  said  Kitty 
[302] 


WHO   WOULD   HAVE   THOUGHT   IT? 

cheerfully,  "I'll  speak  it,  and  you  write  it  my 
way  of  thinking,  and  then  when  we've  finished 
you  will  take  out  of  the  letter  any  words  that 
are  not  pure,  noble,  classic  English.  I  know 
what  you  mean,  and  you  are  quite  right.  Mr. 
Crozier  never  says  'look  here'  or  'mad,'  and  he 
speaks  better  than  any  one  I  ever  heard.  Now, 
we  certainly  must  get  on." 

After  an  instant  she  began  again. 

" — While  I  was  angry  at  you  a  moment  for  break- 
ing your  promise,  I  cannot  reproach  you  for  it,  because 
I,  too,  bet  on  the  Derby,  but  I  bet  on  a  horse  that  you 
had  said  as  much  against  as  you  could.  I  did  it  because 
you  had  very  bad  luck  all  this  year  and  lost,  and  also 
the  year  before,  and  I  thought — " 

For  several  minutes,  with  greater  deliberation 
than  was  usual  with  her,  Kitty  dictated,  and  at 
the  end  of  the  letter  she  said,  "I  am,  dearest, 
your — " 

Here  Mona  sharply  interrupted  her.  "If  you 
don't  mind  I  will  say  that  myself  in  my  own 
way,"  she  said  flushing. 

"Oh,  I  forgot  for  the  moment  that  I  was  speak- 
ing for  you!"  responded  Kitty,  with  a  strange, 
lurking,  undermeaning  in  her  voice.  "I  threw 

[303] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

myself  into  it  so.  Do  you  think  I've  done  the 
thing  right  ?"  she  added. 

With  a  direct,  honest  friendliness  Mona  looked 
into  Kitty's  eyes.  "You  have  said  the  exact 
right  thing  as  to  meaning,  I  am  sure,  and  I  can 
change  an  occasional  word  here  and  there  to  make 
it  all  conventional  English." 

Kitty  nodded.  "Don't  lose  a  minute  in  copy- 
ing it.  We  must  get  the  letter  back  in  his  desk 
as  soon  as  possible." 

As  Mona  wrote  Kitty  sat  with  the  envelope  in 
her  hand,  alternately  looking  at  it  and  into  the 
distance  beyond  the  point  of  pines.  She  was 
certain  that  she  had  found  the  solution  of  the 
troubles  of  Shiel  and  Mona  Crozier,  for  Crozier 
would  now  have  his  fortune,  and  the  return  to 
his  wife  was  a  matter  of  course.  Was  she  alto- 
gether sure1?  But  yes,  she  was  altogether  sure. 
She  remembered,  with  a  sudden,  swift  plunge  of 
blood  in  her  veins,  that  early  dawn  when  she  bent 
over  him  as  he  lay  beneath  the  tree,  and  as  she 
kissed  him  in  his  sleep  he  had  murmured,  "My 
darling!"  That  had  not  been  for  her,  though  it 
had  been  her  kiss  which  had  stirred  his  dreaming 
soul  to  say  the  words.  If  they  had  only  been 
meant  for  her,  then — oh,  then  life  would  be  so 
[304] 


WHO      WOULD      HAVE      THOUGHT      I  T    f 

much  easier  in  the  future !  If — if  she  could  only 
kiss  him  again  and  he  would  wake  and  say — 

She  got  to  her  feet  with  an  involuntary  ex- 
clamation. For  an  instant  she  had  been  lost  in 
a  world  of  her  own,  a  world  of  the  impossible. 

"I  almost  thought  I  heard  a  step  in  the  other 
room,"  she  said  In  explanation  to  Mona.  Going 
to  the  door  of  Crozier's  room  she  appeared  to  lis- 
ten for  a  moment,  and  then  she  opened  it. 

"No,  it  is  all  right,"  she  said. 

In  another  few  minutes  Mona  had  finished  the 
letter.  "Do  you  wish  to  read  it  again?"  she 
asked  Kitty,  but  not  handing  it  to  her. 

"No,  I  leave  the  words  to  you.  It  was  the 
right  meaning  I  wanted  in  it,"  she  replied. 

Suddenly  Mona  came  to  her  and  laid  a  hand 
on  her  arm.  "You  are  wonderful — a  wonderful, 
wise,  beloved  girl,"  she  said,  and  there  were  tears 
in  her  eyes. 

Kitty  gave  the  tiny  fingers  a  spasmodic  clasp, 
and  said:  "Quick,  we  must  get  them  in!"  She 
put  the  banknotes  inside  the  sheets  of  paper,  then 
hastily  placed  both  in  the  envelope  and  sealed  the 
envelope  again. 

"It's  just  a  tiny  bit  damp  with  the  steam  yet, 
but  it  will  be  all  right  in  five  minutes.  How 
[  305  ] 


YOU  NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

soiled  the  envelope  is !"  Kitty  added.  "Five  years 
in  and  out  of  the  desk,  in  and  out  of  his  pocket — 
but  all  so  nice  and  sunsoiled  and  sweet  and  bonny 
inside,"  she  added.  "To  say  nothing  of  the  baw- 
bees, as  Mr.  Crozier  calls  money.  Well,  we  are 
ready.  It  all  depends  on  you  now,  Mrs.  Cro- 
zier." 

"No,  not  all." 

"He  used  to  be  afraid  of  you;  now  you  are 
afraid  of  him,"  said  Kitty,  as  though  stating  a 
commonplace. 

There  was  no  more  shrewishness  left  in  the  lit- 
tle woman  to  meet  this  chastisement.  The  forces 
against  her  were  too  many.  Loneliness  and  the 
long  struggle  to  face  the  world  without  her  man ; 
the  determination  of  this  masterful  young  woman 
who  had  been  so  long  a  part  of  her  husband's 
life;  and,  more  than  all,  a  new  feeling  al- 
together— love,  and  the  dependence  a  woman 
feels,  the  longing  to  find  rest  in  strong  arms, 
which  comes  with  the  first  revelation  of  love,  had 
conquered  what  Kitty  had  called  her  "bossiness." 
She  was  now  tremulous  before  the  crisis  which 
she  must  presently  face.  Pride  in  her  fortune, 
in  her  independence,  had  died  down  in  her.  .  She 
no  longer  thought  of  herself  as  a  woman  espe- 

[306] 


WHO   WOULD   HAVE   THOUGHT   IT? 

cially  endowed  and  privileged.  She  took  her 
fortune  now  like  a  man;  for  she  had  been  taught 
that  a  man  could  set  her  aside  just  because  she 
had  money,  could  desert  her  to  be  independent  of 
it.  It  had  been  a  revelation  to  her,  and  she  was 
chastened  of  all  the  termagancy  visible  and  in- 
visible in  her.  She  stood  now  before  Kitty  of  "a 
humble  and  a  contrite  heart,"  and  made  no  reply 
at  all  to  the  implied  challenge.  Kitty,  instantly 
sorry  for  what  she  had  said,  let  it  go  at  that. 
She  was  only  now  aware  of  how  deeply  her  arrows 
had  gone  home. 

As  they  stood  silent  there  was  a  click  at  the 
gate.  Kitty  ran  into  Crozier's  room,  thrust  the 
letter  into  its  pigeonhole  in  the  desk,  and  in  a 
moment  was  back  again.  In  the  garden  the 
Young  Doctor  was  holding  Crozier  in  conversa- 
tion, but  watching  the  front  door.  So  soon,  how- 
ever, as  Kitty  had  shown  herself,  as  she  had  prom- 
ised, at  the  front  door  and  then  disappeared,  he 
turned  Crozier  towards  the  house  again  by  an 
adroit  word,  and  left  him  at  the  door-step. 

Seeing  who  was  inside  the  room  Crozier  hesi- 
tated, and  his  long  face,  with  paleness  added  to 
its  asceticism,  took  on  a  look  which  could  have 
given  no  hope  of  happiness  to  Mona.  It  went 
[307] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

to  her  heart  as  no  look  of  his  had  ever  gone. 
Suddenly  she  had  a  revelation  of  how  little  she 
had  known  of  what  he  was,  or  what  any  man  was 
or  could  be,  or  of  those  springs  of  nature  lying  far 
below  the  outer  lives  which  move  in  orbits  of 
sheltering  convention.  It  is  because  some  men 
and  women  are  so  sheltered  from  the  storms  of 
life  by  wealth  and  comfort  that  these  piercing 
agonies  which  strike  down  to  the  uttermost 
depths  so  seldom  reach  them. 

Shiel  half  turned  away,  not  sullen,  not  morose, 
but  with  a  strange  apathy  settled  on  him.  He 
had  once  heard  a  man  say,  "I  feel  as  though  I 
wanted  to  crawl  into  a  hole  and  die."  That  was 
the  way  he  felt  now,  for  to  be  beaten  in  the  game 
which  you  have  played  like  a  man  yourself  and 
have  been  fouled  into  an  unchallenged  defeat, 
without  the  voice  of  the  umpire,  is  a  fate  which 
has  smothered  the  soul  of  better  men  than  Cro- 
zier. 

Mona's  voice  stopped  him.  "Do  not  go, 
Shiel,"  she  urged  gently.  "No,  you  must  not  go. 
I  want  justice  from  you,  if  nothing  else.  You 
must  play  the  game  with  me.  I  want  justice. 
I  have  to  say  some  things  I  had  no  chance  to  say 
before,  and  I  want  to  hear  some  things  I  have 

[308] 


WHO      WOULD      HAVE      THOUGHT      IT? 

a   right   to   hear.     Indeed,   you   must   play    the 
game." 

He  drew  himself  up.  Not  to  be  a  sportsman, 
not  to  play  the  game — to  accuse  him  of  this 
would  have  brought  him  back  from  the  edge  of 
the  grave. 

"I'm  not  fit  to-day.  Let  it  be  to-morrow, 
Mona,"  was  his  hesitating  reply;  but  he  did  not 
leave  the  doorway. 

She  shook  her  head  and  made  a  swift  little 
childlike  gesture  towards  him.  "We  are  sure  of 
to-day;  we  are  not  sure  of  to-morrow.  One  or 
the  other  of  us  might  not  be  here  to-morrow. 
Let  us  do  to-day  the  thing  that  belongs  to  to- 
day." 

That  note  struck  home,  for  indeed  the  black 
spirit  which  whispers  to  men  in  their  most 
despairing  hours  to  end  it  all  had  whispered  to 
him. 

"Let  us  do  to-day  the  thing  that  belongs  to 
to-day,"  she  had  just  said,  and,  strange  to  say, 
there  shot  into  his  mind  words  that  belonged  to 
the  days  when  he  went  to  church  at  Castlegarry 
and  thought  of  a  thousand  things  other  than 
prayer  or  praise,  but  yet  heard  with  the  acute  ears 
of  the  young,  and  remembered  with  the  persist- 

[809'] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

ent  memory  of  youth.  "For  the  night  cometh 
when  no  man  can  work"  were  the  words  which 
came  to  him.  He  shuddered  slightly.  Suppose 
that  this  indeed  was  the  beginning  of  the  night! 
As  she  said,  he  must  play  the  game — play  it  as 
Crozier  of  Lammis  would  have  played  it. 

He  stepped  inside  the  room.  "Let  it  be  to- 
day," he  said. 

"We  may  be  interrupted  in  this  room,"  she  re- 
plied. Courage  came  to  her.  "Let  us  talk  in 
your  room,"  she  added,  and  going  over  she 
opened  the  door  of  it  and  walked  in.  The  ma- 
tured modesty  of  a  lost  five  years  was  not  about 
her  now.  She  was  a  woman  fighting  for  her  hap- 
piness, and  she  had  been  so  beaten  by  the  rods  of 
scorn,  so  smothered  by  the  dust  of  humiliation, 
that  she  had  now  the  courage  of  those  who  can 
bear  no  more  and  would  rather  die  fighting  than 
in  the  lethargy  of  despair. 

It  was  like  her  old  self  to  take  the  initiative, 
but  she  did  it  now  in  so  different  a  way — without 
masterfulness  or  assumption.  It  was  rather  like 
saying,  "I  will  do  what  I  know  you  wish  me  to 
do;  I  will  lay  all  reserve  aside  for  your  sake;  I 
will  be  bold  because  I  love  you." 
[310] 


WHO      WOULD      HAVE      THOUGHT      I  T    f 

He  shut  the  door  behind  them  and  motioned 
her  to  a  chair. 

"No,  I  will  not  sit,"  she  said.  "That  is  too 
formal.  You  ask  any  stranger  to  sit.  I  am  at 
home  here,  Shiel,  and  I  will  stand." 

"What  was  it  you  wanted  to  say,  Mona?"  he 
asked,  scarcely  looking  at  her. 

"I  should  like  to  think  that  there  was  some- 
thing you  wished  to  hear,"  she  replied.  "Don't 
you  want  to  know  all  that  has  happened  since  you 
left  us — about  me,  about  your  brother,  about 
your  friends,  about  Lammis*?  I  bought  Lammis 
at  the  sale  you  ordered:  it  is  still  ours."  She 
gave  emphasis  to  "ours."  "You  may  not  want 
to  hear  all  that  has  happened  to  me  since  you  left, 
still  I  must  tell  you  some  things  that  you  ought 
to  know,  if  we  are  going  to  part  again.  You 
treated  me  badly.  There  was  no  reason  why  you 
should  have  left  and  placed  me  in  the  position 
you  did." 

His  head  came  up  sharply  and  his  voice  became 
a  little  hard.  "I  told  you  I  was  penniless,  and 
I  would  not  live  on  you,  and  I  could  do  nothing 
in  England;  I  had  no  trade  or  profession.  If  I 
had  said  good-bye  to  you,  you  would  probably 
[311] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

have  offered  me  a  ticket  to  Canada.  As  I  was  a 
pauper  I  preferred  to  go  with  what  I  had  out  of 
the  wreck — just  enough  to  bring  me  here.  But 
I've  earned  my  own  living  since." 

"Penniless — just  enough  to  bring  you  out 
here !"  Her  voice  had  a  sound  of  honest  amaze- 
ment. "How  can  you  say  such  a  thing!  You 
had  my  letter — you  said  you  had  my  letter?" 

"Yes,  I  had  your  letter,"  he  answered.  "Your 
kind  young  brother  brought  it  to  me.  You  had 
told  him  all  the  dear  womanly  things  you  had 
said  or  were  going  to  say  to  your  husband,  and 
he  passed  them  on  to  me  with  the  letter." 

"Never  mind  what  he  said  to  you,  Shiel.  It 
was  what  I  said  that  mattered."  She  was  get- 
ting bolder  every  minute.  The  comedy  was  play- 
ing into  her  hands. 

"You  said  the  same  things  in  the  letter  you 
wrote  me,"  he  replied. 

Her  protest  sounded  indignantly  real.  "I  said 
nothing  in  the  letter  I  wrote  you  that  any  man 
would  not  wish  to  hear.  Is  it  so  unpleasant  for 
a  man  who  thinks  he  is  penniless  to  be  told  that 
he  has  made  the  year's  income  of — of  a  cabinet 
minister"?" 

"I  don't  understand,"  he  returned  helplessly. 
[312] 


WHO   WOULD   HAVE   THOUGHT   IT? 

"You  talk  as  though  you  had  never  read  my 
letter." 

"I  never  have  read  your  letter,"  he  replied  in 
bewilderment. 

Her  face  had  the  flush  of  honest  anger.  "You 
do  not  dare  to  tell  me  you  destroyed  my  letter 
without  reading  it — that  you  destroyed  all  that 
letter  contained  simply  because  you  no  longer 
cared  for  your  wife;  because  you  wanted  to  be 
rid  of  her,  wanted  to  vanish  and  never  see  her 
any  more,  and  so  go  and  leave  no  trace  of  your- 
self. You  have  the  courage  here  to  my  face" — 
the  comedy  of  the  situation  gained  much  from 
the  mock  indignation — she  no  longer  had  any  com- 
punctions— "to  say  that  you  destroyed  my  letter 
and  what  it  contained — a  small  fortune  it  would 
be  out  here !" 

"I  did  not  destroy  your  letter,  Mona,"  was  the 
embarrassed  response. 

"Then  what  did  you  do  with  it?  Gave  it  to 
some  one  else  to  read — to  some  other  woman,  per- 
haps." 

He   was   really  shocked  and  greatly  pained. 
"Hush!     You  shall  not  .say  that  kind  of  thing, 
Mona.     I've  never  had  anything  to  do  with  any 
woman  but  my  wife  since  I  married  her." 
[313] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

"Then  what  did  you  do  with  the  letter  V" 

"It's  there,"  he  said,  pointing  to  the  high  desk 
with  the  green-baize  top. 

"And  you  say  you  have  never  read  it1?" 

"Never." 

She  raised  her  head  with  dainty  haughtiness. 
"Then  if  you  have  still  the  same  sense  of  honour 
that  made  you  keep  faith  with  the  bookmakers— 
you  didn't  run  away  from  them! — read  it  now, 
here  in  my  presence.  Read  it,  Shiel.  I  demand 
that  you  read  it  now.  It  is  my  right.  You  are 
in  honour  bound — " 

It  was  the  only  way.  She  dare  not  give  him 
time  to  question,  to  suspect;  she  must  sweep  him 
along  to  conviction.  She  was  by  no  means  sure 
that  there  wasn't  a  flaw  in  the  scheme  some- 
where, something  that  would  betray  her;  and  she 
could  hardly  wait  till  it  was  over,  till  he  had  read 
the  letter. 

In  a  moment  he  was  again  near  her  with  the 
letter  in  his  hand. 

"Yes,  that's  it — that's  the  letter,"  she  said  with 
wondering  and  reproachful  eyes.  "I  remember 
the  little  scratchy  blot  from  the  pen  on  the  en- 
velope. There  it  is  just  as  I  made  it  five  years 
ago.  But  how  disgracefully  soiled  the  envelope 

[314] 


WHO      WOULD      HAVE      THOUGHT      IT* 

is!  I  suppose  it  has  been  tossed  about  in  your 
saddlebag,  or  with  your  old  clothes,  and  only 
kept  to  remind  you  day  by  day  that  you  had  a 
wife  you  couldn't  live  with — kept  as  a  warning 
never  to  think  of  her  except  to  say,  'I  hate  you, 
Mona,  because  you  are  rich  and  heartless  and  not 
bigger  than  a  pinch  of  snuff.'  That  was  the  kind 
way  you  used  to  speak  of  her  even  when  you 
were  first  married  to  her — contemptuously,  con- 
temptuously always  in  your  heart,  no  matter  what 
you  said  out  loud.  And  the  end  showed  it — the 
end  showed  it :  you  deserted  her !" 

He  was  so  fascinated  by  the  picture  she  made 
of  passion  and  incensed  declamation  that  he  did 
not  attempt  to  open  the  letter,  and  he  wondered 
why  there  was  such  a  difference  between  the  ef- 
fect of  her  temper  on  him  now  and  the  effect  of 
it  those  long  years  ago.  He  had  no  feeling  of 
uneasiness  in  her  presence  now,  no  sense  of  irri- 
tation. In  spite  of  her  tirade,  he  had  a  feeling 
that  it  didn't  matter,  that  she  must  bluster  in  her 
tiny  tea-cup  if  she  wanted  to  do  so. 

"Open  the  letter  at  once,"  she  insisted.  "If 
you  don't,  I  will."  She  made  as  though  to  take 
the  letter  from  him,  but  with  a  sudden  twist  he 
tore  open  the  envelope.  The  bank-notes  fell  to 

[S15] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

the  floor  as  he  took  out  the  sheet  inside.  Won- 
dering, he  stooped  to  pick  them  up. 

"Four  thousand  pounds!"  he  exclaimed,  ex- 
amining them.  "What  does  it  mean"?" 

"Read,"  she  commanded. 

He  devoured  the  letter.  His  eyes  swam;  then 
there  rushed  into  them  the  flame  which  always 
made  them  illumine  his  mediaeval  face  like  the 
light  from  "the  burning  bush."  He  did  not 
question  or  doubt,  because  he  saw  what  he 
wished  to  see,  which  is  the  way  of  man.  It  all 
looked  perfectly  natural  and  convincing  to 
him. 

"Mona — Mona — heaven  above  and  all  the 
gods  of  hell  and  Hellas,  what  a  fool,  what  a  fool 
I've  been!"  he  exclaimed.  "Mona — Mona,  tell 
me,  can  you  forgive  me*?  I  didn't  read  this  let- 
ter because  I  thought  it  was  going  to  slash  me  on 
the  raw — on  the  raw  flesh  of  my  own  lacerating. 
I  simply  couldn't  bear  to  read  what  your  brother 
said  was  in  the  letter.  Yet  I  couldn't  destroy  it, 
either.  It  was  you.  I  had  to  keep  it.  Mona, 
tell  me,  is  it  too  late?" 

He  held  out  his  arms  with  a  passionate  ex- 
clamation. 

"I  asked  you  to  kiss  me  yesterday  and  you 
[316] 


WHO      WOULD      HAVE      THOUGHT      I  T    £ 

wouldn't,"  she  protested.  "I  tried  to  make  you 
love  me  yesterday,  and  you  wouldn't.  When  a 
woman  gets  a  rebuff  like  that,  when — " 

She  could  not  bear  it  any  longer.  With  a  cry 
of  joy  she  was  in  his  arms. 

After  a  moment  he  said,  "The  best  of  all  was, 
that  you — you  vixen,  you  bet  on  that  Derby  and 
won,  and — " 

"With  your  money,  remember,  Shiel." 

"With  my  money!"  he  cried  exultingly. 
"Yes,  that's  the  best  of  it — the  next  best  of  it. 
It  was  your  betting  that  was  the  best  of  all — the 
best  thing  you  ever  did  since  we  married,  except 
your  coming  here !" 

"It's  in  time  to  help  you,  too — with  your  own 
money,  isn't  it?" 

He  glanced  at  his  watch.  "Hours — I'm  hours 
to  the  good.  That  crowd — that  gang  of 
thieves — that  bunch  of  highwaymen!  I've  got 
them — got  them,  and  got  a  hundred  and  fifty 
thousand  dollars,  too,  to  start  again  at  home — at 
Lammis,  Mona,  back  on  the — but  no,  I'm  not 
sure  that  I  can  live  there  now  after  this  big  life 
out  here." 

"I'm  not  so  sure,  either,"  Mona  replied,  with 
a  light  of  larger  understanding  in  her  eyes. 
[317] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR  LUCK 

"But  we'll  have  to  go  back  and  stop  the  world 
talking,  and  put  things  in  shape  before  we  come 
here  to  stay." 

"To  stay  here — do  you  mean  that?"  he  asked 
eagerly. 

"Somewhere  in  this  big  land,"  she  replied 
softly;  "anyhow,  to  stay  here  till  I've  grown  up 
a  little.  I  wasn't  only  small  in  body  in  the  old 
days,  I  was  small  in  mind,  Shiel." 

"Anyhow,  I've  done  with  betting  and  racing, 
Mona.  I've  just  got  time  left — I'm  only  thirty- 
nine — to  start  and  really  do  something  with  my- 
self." 

"Well,  start  now,  dear  man.  What  is  it  you 
have  to  do  before  twelve  o'clock  to-night?" 

"What  is  it?  Why,  I  have  to  pay  over  two 
thousand  of  this," — he  flourished  the  bank- 
notes— "and  even  then  I'll  still  have  two  thou- 
sand left.  But  wait — wait.  There  was  the 
original  fifty  pounds.  Where  is  that  fifty 
pounds,  little  girl  alive?  Out  with  it.  This  is 
the  profit.  Where  is  the  fifty  you  bet  with?" 
His  voice  was  gay  with  raillery. 

She  could  look  him  in  the  face  now  and  pre- 
varicate without  any  shame  or  compunction  at 
all.  "That  fifty  pounds — that!  Why,  I  used  it 
[318] 


WHO      WOULD     HAVE     THOUGHT     IT*? 

to   buy   my    ticket    for   Canada.     My   husband 
ought  to  pay  my  expenses  out  to  him." 

He  laughed  greatly.  All  Ireland  was  noting 
in  his  veins  now.  He  had  no  logic  or  reasoning 
left.  "Well,  that's  the  way  to  get  into  your  old 
man's  heart,  Mona.  To  think  of  that!  I  call 
it  tact  divine.  Everything  has  spun  my  way  at 
last.  I  was  right  about  that  Derby,  after  all. 
It  was  in  my  bones  that  I'd  make  a  pot  out  of  it, 
but  I  thought  I  had  lost  it  all  when  Flamingo 
went  down." 

"You  never  know  your  luck — you  used  to  say 
that,  Shiel." 

"I  say  it  again.  Come,  we  must  tell  our 
friends — Kitty,  her  mother,  and  the  Young  Doc- 
tor. You  don't  know  what  good  friends  they 
have  been  to  me,  mavourneen." 

"Yes,  I  think  I  do!"  said  Mona,  opening  the 
door  to  the  outer  room. 

Then  Crozier  called  with  a  great,  cheery 
voice — what  Mona  used  to  call  his  tally-ho  voice. 
Mrs.  Tynan  appeared  smiling.  She  knew  at 
a  glance  what  had  happened.  It  was  so  in- 
teresting that  she  could  even  forgive  Mona. 

"Where's  Kitty*?"  asked  Crozier,  almost 
boisterously. 

[319] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

"She  has  gone  for  a  ride  with  John  Sihley," 
answered  Mrs.  Tynan. 

"Look,  there  she  is!"  said  Mona,  laying  a  hand 
on  Crozier's  arm,  and  pointing  with  the  other 
out  over  the  prairie. 

Crozier  looked  out  toward  the  northwestern 
horizon,  and  in  the  distance  was  a  woman  riding 
as  hard  as  her  horse  could  go,  with  a  man  gallop- 
ing hard  after  her.  It  seemed  as  though  they 
were  riding  into  the  sunset. 

"She's  riding  the  horse  you  won  that  race  with 
years  ago  when  you  first  came  here,  Mr.  Crozier," 
said  Mrs.  Tynan.  "John  Sibley  bought  it  from 
Mr.  Brennan." 

Mona  did  not  see  the  look  which  came  into 
Crozier's  face  as,  with  one  hand  shading  his  eyes 
and  the  other  grasping  the  bank-notes  which  were 
to  start  him  in  life  again,  independent  and  self- 
respecting,  he  watched  the  girl  riding  on  and  on 
ever  ahead  of  the  man. 

It  was  at  that  moment  the  Young  Doctor  en- 
tered the  room,  and  he  distracted  Mona's  atten- 
tion for  a  moment.  Going  forward  to  him  Mona 
shook  him  warmly  by  the  hand.  Then  she  went 
up  to  Mrs.  Tynan  and  kissed  her. 

"I  would  like  to  kiss  your  daughter  too,  Mrs. 

[320] 


WHO   WOULD   HAVE   THOUGHT   IT? 

Tynan,"  Mona  said.  "What  are  you  looking  at 
so  hard,  Shiel  *?"  she  presently  added  to  her  hus- 
band. 

He  did  not  turn  to  her.  His  eyes  were  still 
shaded  by  his  hand. 

"That  horse  goes  well  yet,"  he  said  in  a  low 
voice.  "As  good  as  ever — as  good  as  ever." 

"He  loves  horses  so,"  remarked  Mona,  as 
though  she  could  tell  Mrs.  Tynan  and  the  Young 
Doctor  anything  about  Shiel  Crozier  that  they 
did  not  know. 

"Kitty  rides  well,  doesn't  she*?"  asked  Mrs. 
Tynan  of  Crozier. 

"What  a  pair — girl  and  horse!"  Crozier  ex- 
claimed. "Thoroughbred — absolutely  thorough- 
bred!" 

Kitty  had  ridden  away  with  her  secret,  her 
very  own,  as  she  thought:  but  Shiel  Crozier 
knew — the  man  that  mattered  knew. 


[821] 


EPILOGUE 


GOLDEN,  all  golden,  save  where  there  was  a 
fringe  of  trees  at  a  watercourse ;  save  where 
a  garden,  like  a  spot  of  emerald,  made  a  button 
on  the  royal  garment  wrapped  across  the  breast 
of  the  prairie.  Above,  making  for  the  trees  of 
the  foothills  far  away,  a  golden  eagle  floated,  a 
prairie-hen  sped  affrighted  from  some  invisible 
thing;  and  in  the  far  distance  a  railway  train 
slipped  down  the  plain  like  a  serpent  making  for 
covert  in  the  first  hills  of  the  first  world  that 
ever  was. 

At  casual  glance  the  vast  plain  seemed  unin- 
habited, yet  here  and  there  were  men  and  horses 
tiny  in  the  vastness,  but  conquering.  Here  and 
there  also — for  it  was  July — a  haymaker  sharp- 
ened his  scythe  and  the  sound  came  singing 
through  the  air  as  radiant  as  it  was  stirring  with 
life. 

Seated  in  the  shade  of  a  clump  of  trees  a  girl 


EPILOGUE 

sat  with  her  chin  in  her  hands  looking  out  over 
the  prairie,  an  intense  dreaming  in  her  eyes.  Her 
horse  was  tethered  near  by,  but  it  scarcely  made  a 
sound.  It  was  a  horse  which  had  once  won  a 
great  race,  with  an  Irish  gentleman  on  his  back. 
Long  time  the  girl  sat  absorbed,  her  golden 
colour,  her  brown-gold  hair  in  harmony  with 
the  universal  stencil  of  gold.  With  her  eyes 
drowned  in  the  distance,  she  presently  murmured 
something  to  herself,  and  as  she  did  so  the  eyes 
deepened  to  a  nameless  umber  tone,  deeper  than 
gold,  warmer  than  brown;  such  a  colour  as  only 
can  be  found  in  a  jewel  or  in  a  leaf  the  frost  has 
touched. 

The  frost  had  touched  the  soul  which  gave  the 
colour  to  the  eyes  of  the  girl.  Yet  she  seemed 
all  summer,  all  glow  and  youth  and  gladness. 
Her  voice  was  golden,  too,  and  the  words  which 
fell  from  her  lips  were  as  though  tuned  to  the 
sound  of  falling  water.  The  tone  of  the  voice 
would  last  when  the  gold  of  all  else  became  faded 
or  tarnished.  It  had  its  origin  in  the  soul : — 

"Whereaway  goes  my  lad?     Tell  me,  has  he  gone  alone! 

Never  harsh  word  did  I  speak;  never  hurt  I  gave; 
Strong  he  was  and  beautiful ;  like  a  heron  he  has  flown — 

Hereaway,  hereaway  will  I  make  my  grave." 
[823] 


YOU   NEVER  KNOW  YOUR  LUCK 

The  voice  lingered  on  the  words  till  it  trailed 
away  into  nothing,  like  the  vanishing  note  of  a 
violin  which  seems  still  to  pulse  faintly  after 
the  sound  has  ceased. 

"But  he  did  not  go  alone,  and  I  have  not  made 
my  grave,"  the  girl  said,  and  raised  her  head  at 
the  sound  of  approaching  footsteps.  With  an 
effort  she  emerged  from  the  half-trance  in  which 
she  had  been,  and  smiled  at  the  man  approaching. 

"Dear  bully,  bulbous  being — how  that  word 
'bully'  would  have  made  her  cringe !"  she  said  as 
the  man  ambled  towards  her.  He  could  not  go 
as  fast  as  his  mind  urged  him. 

'I've  got  news — news,  news!"  he  said  as 
he  waded  through  his  own  perspiration  towards 
her. 

"I  can  guess  what  it  is,"  the  girl  remarked 
smilingly,  as  she  reached  out  a  hand  to  him,  but 
remained  seated.  "It's  a  real,  live  baby  born  to 
Lydia,  wife  of  Methuselah,  the  woman  also  be- 
ing of  goodly  years.  It  is,  isn't  it*?" 

"The  fattest,  finest,  most  'scrumpshus'  son  of 
all  the  ages,  that  ever — " 

Kitty  laughed  happily  and  very  whimsically. 
"Like  none  since  Moses  was  found  among  the 
bulrushes !  Where  was  this  one  found,  and  what 

[324] 


EPILOGUE 


do  you  intend  to  call  him — Jesse,  after  his 
'pa"?" 

"No — nothing  so  common.  He's  to  be  called 
Shiel — Shiel  Crozier  Bulrush,  that's  to  be  his 
name." 

The  face  of  the  girl  became  a  shade  pensive 
now.  "Oh !  And  do  you  think  you  can  guaran- 
tee that  he  will  be  worth  the  name'?  Do  you 
never  think  what  his  father  is4?" 

"I'm  starting  him  right  with  that  name.  I 
can  do  so  much,  anyway,"  laughed  the  imper- 
turbable one. 

"And  Mrs.  Bulrush,  after  her  great  effort — 
how  is  she?" 

"Flying — simply  flying!  Earth  not  good 
enough  for  her.  Simply  flying.  But  here — here 
is  more  news.  Guess  what — it's  for  you.  I've 
just  come  from  the  post-office,  and  they  said 
there  was  an  English  letter  for  you,  so  I  brought 
it." 

He  handed  it  over.  She  laid  it  in  her  lap  and 
waited  as  though  for  him  to  go. 

"Can't  I  hear  how  he  is?  He's  the  best  man 
that  ever  crossed  my  path,"  he  said. 

"It  happens  to  be  in  his  wife's,  not  his,  hand- 
writing— did  ever  such  a  scrap  of  a  woman  write 

[325] 


YOU   NEVER   KNOW   YOUR   LUCK 

so  sprawling  a  hand!"  she  replied,  holding  the 
letter  up. 

"But  she'll  let  us  know  in  the  letter  how  he 
is,  won't  she?" 

Kitty  had  now  recovered  herself,  and  slowly 
she  opened  the  envelope  and  took  out  the  letter. 
As  she  did  so  something  fluttered  to  the  ground. 

Jesse  Bulrush  picked  it  up.  "That  looks 
nice,"  he  said,  and  he  whistled  in  surprise.  "It's 
a  money-draft  on  a  bank." 

Kitty,  whose  eyes  were  fixed  on  the  big,  im- 
portant handwriting,  answered  calmly  and  with- 
out apparently  looking,  as  she  took  the  paper  from 
his  hand:  "Yes,  it's  a  wedding  present — five 
hundred  dollars — to  buy  what  I  like  best  for  my 
home.  So  she  sap." 

"Mrs.  Crozier,  of  course." 

"Of  course." 

"Well,  that's  magnificent.  What  will  you  do 
with  it*" 

Kitty  rose  and  held  out  her  hand.  "Go  back 
to  your  flying  partner,  happy  man,  and  ask  her 
what  she  would  do  with  five  hundred  dollars  if 
she  had  iL" 

"She'd  buy  her  lord  and  master  a  present  with 
h,  of  course,"  he  answered. 
[3£6] 


EPILOGUE 

"Good-bye,  Mr.  Roly-poly,"  she  responded, 
laughing.  "You  always  could  think  of  things 
for  other  people  to  do;  and  have  never  done  any- 
thing yourself  until  now.  Good-bye,  father!" 

When  he  was  gone  and  out  of  sight  her  face 
changed.  With  sudden  anger  she  crushed  and 
crumpled  up  the  draft  for  five  hundred  in  her 
hand.  "  'A  token  of  affection  from  both' !  "  she 
exclaimed,  quoting  the  letter.  "One  lone  leaf  of 
Irish  shamrock  from  him  would — " 

She  stopped.  "But  he  will  send  a  message  of 
his  own,"  she  continued.  "He  will — he  will. 
Even  if  he  doesn't,  I'll  know  that  he  remembers 
just  the  same.  He  does — he  does  remember." 

She  drew  herself  up  with  an  effort,  and,  as  it 
were,  shook  herself  free  from  the  memories  which 
dimmed  her  eyes. 

Not  far  away  a  man  was  riding  toward  the 
clump  of  trees  where  she  was.  She  saw,  and 
hastened  to  her  horse. 

"If  I  told  John  all  I  feel  he'd  understand.  I 
believe  he  always  has  understood,"  she  added 
with  a  far-off  look. 

The  draft  was  still  crushed  in  her  hand  when 
she  mounted  the  beloved  horse,  whose  name  now 
was  Shiel. 

[327] 


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Mam'  Linda Witt  N.  Harben 

Marriage E.G.  Wells 

Marriage  a  la  Mode Mrs.  Humphrey  Ward 

Master  Mummer,  The E.  Phillips  Oppenheim 

Masters  of  the  WTieatlands Harold  Bindloss 

Max Katherine  Cecil  Thurston 

Mediator,  The Roy  Norton 

Memoirs  of  Sherlock  Holmes A.  Conan  Doyle 

Missaoner,  The E.  Phillips  Oppenheim 

Miss  Gibbie  Gault Kate  Langley  Bosher 


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Miss  Philura's  Wedding  Gown. 

Florence  Morse  Kingsley 

Miss  Selina  Lue Maria  Thompson  Davieit 

Mollie's  Prince Rota  N.  Carey 

Molly  McDonald Randall  Parrish 

Money  Moon,  The Jeffery  Farnol 

Motor  Maid,  The C.N.andA.M.  Williamson 

Moth,  The William  Dana  Orcutt 

Mountain  Girl,  The. Payne  Erskine 

Mr.  Pratt Joseph  C.  Lincoln 

Mr.  Pratt's  Patients Joseph  C.  Lincoln 

Mrs.  Red  Pepper Grace  S.  Richmond 

My  Friend  the  Chauffeur .  C.N.  and  A .  M.  Williamton 

My  Lady  Caprice Jeffery  Farnol 

My  Lady  of  Doubt Randall  Parrish 

My  Lady  of  the  North Randall  Parrish 

My  Lady  of  the  South Randall  Parrish 

Mystery  Tales Edgar  AUen  Poe 

Mystery  of  the  Boule  Cabinet,  The. 

Burton  E.  Stevenson 

Nancy  Stair Elinor  Macartney  Lane 

Ne'er-Do-Well,  The Rex  Beach 

Net,  The Rex  Beach 

NightRiders,  The RidgwellCullum 

No  Friend  Like  a  Sister Rosa  N.  Carey 

Officer  666.  .Barton  W.  Currie  and  Augustin  McHugh 

Once  Upon  a  Time Richard  Harding  Davis 

One  Braver  Thing Richard  Dehan 

One  Way  Trail,  The Ridgwell  Cullum 

Orphan,  The Clarence  E.  Mulford 

Out  of  the  Primitive Robert  Ames  Bennet 

Pam Bettina  Von  Hutten 

Pam  Decides Bettina  Von  Hutten 

Pardners Rex  Beach 

Parrot  &  Co Harold  McGrath 

Partners  of  the  Tide Joseph  C.  Lincoln 

Passage  Perilous,  The Rosa  N.  Carey 

Passionate  Friends,  The H.  G,  Wells 

Paul  Anthony,  Christian Hiram  W.  Hays 

Peter  Ruff. ." E.  Phillips  Oppenheim 

Phillip  Steele James  Oliver  Curwood 


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Phra  the  Phoenician Edirin  Letter  Arnold 

Pidgin  Island Harold  MacGrath 

Place  of  Honeymoons,  The Harold  MacGrath 

Pleasures  and  Palaces Juliet  Wilbor  Tompkira 

Plunderer,  The Roy  Norton 

Pole  Baker Witt  N.  Harbm 

Pool  of  Flame,  The Louis  Joseph  Vane* 

Polly  of  the  Circus Margaret  Mayo 

Poppy Cynthia  Stockley 

Port  of  Adventure,  The . .  C.  N.  and  A.  M.  Williamson 

Postmaster,  The Joseph  C.  Lincoln 

Power  and  the  Glory,  The. .  .Grace  McGowan  Cook* 
Price  of  the  Prairie,  The. . .  .Margaret  Hill  McCarttr 

Prince  of  Sinners,  A E.  Phillips  Oppenheim 

Prince  or  Chauffeur Lawrence  Perry 

Princess  Passes,  The — C.N.  and  A.  M.  Williamson 
Princess  Virginia,  The.  .C.  N.  and  A  M.  Williamson 

Prisoners  of  Chance Randall  Parri$h 

Prodigal  Son,  The HallCaine 

Purple  Parasol,  The George  Ban  McCuteheon 

R.  J.'s  Mother Margaret  Deland 

Ranching  for  Sylvia Harold  Bindloa 

Reason  Why,  The Elinor  Glyn 

Redemption  of  Kenneth  Gait,  The.  .Witt  N.  Harbm 

Red  Cross  Girl,  The Richard  Harding  Davis 

Red  Lane,  The Holman  Day 

Red  Pepper  Burns Grace  S.  Richmond 

Red  Republic,  The Robert  W.  Chambers 

Refugees,  The A.  Canon  Doyle 

Rejuvenation  of  Aunt  Mary,  The Anne  Warner 

Rise  of  Roscoe  Paine,  The Joseph  C.  Lincoln 

Road  to  Providence,  The. .  .Maria  Thompson  Davitst 

Robinetta Kate  Douglas  Wiggin 

Rose  in  the  Ring,  The George  Ban  McCuteheon 

Rose  of  the  World Agnes  and  Egerttm  Cattle 

Rose  of  Old  Harpj'.th,  The . .  Maria  Thompson  Damess 
Round  the  Corner  in  Gay  Street . . .  Grace  S.  Richmond 

Routledge  Rides  Alone Will  Levington  Comfort 

Rue:  With  a  Difference Rosa  N.  Carey 

St.  Elmo  (Illustrated  Edition) Augusta  J.  Erans 

Seats  of  the  Mighty,  The Gilbert  Parker 


